Marathon Training – the notorious neon

GENDRY DIDN’T GIVE UP | marathon monday week #15

Hey guys I am BACK! I was packing and moving all of last week and that shit got stressful so I had to drop everything and work on getting prepped for the movers. Regardless, I did manage to get my running in and of course all the thinking that comes with it. Lol.

my parents were in town for my move and this was their view at planet hollywood. like HELLO VEGAS!

desert smash @ Hexx Kitchen – gin, blackberries, rosemary agave, lime juice

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

So last week I did this amazing 5 mile run. I felt so relaxed and confident the entire time. The music was bumping and I was throughly in the groove. When I find myself in a good groove like this, it allows me to actually enjoy the run, which is a nice touch.

Once my run was complete, I looked at my pace and I wanted to faint. I was looking at thee SLOWEST 5 miles I have ever done. Talk about deflating that ego. What happened? Why didn’t my pace match how I felt about my run?

I’m here to tell you folks, sometimes the numbers do lie.

We’ve all heard stories about friends who are working to get into better shape. They feel so good, yet, their weight is slow to drop. There are stories about rich men and women who are the unhappiest people on the planet while some who are not-so rich are living full, blissful lives. One donut is perfect, yet seven of them produce unpleasant consequences.

You see what I’m getting at…the numbers aren’t always indicative of our level of success.

As a runner, I get so caught up in beating my pace from the last run or how fast I have to run to qualify for Boston. (It’s really fast.) In life, we get caught up with our weight, the amount of zeros in our bank account or pairs of shoes we own (so guilty).

What if we had no concept of the numbers? If weighing ourselves wasn’t such a falsely inflated milestone on a weight-loss journey? If we unsubscribed from those Nike Store emails?

Would we ignore what the numbers were telling us and determine success based on how we feel about our work? I’m guessing we would. Perhaps we would celebrate our success and that would only inspire and drive us to go out and do it again.

Now, I’m not saying that achieving big things is pain-free – not even a little bit! What I’m trying to convey is that it doesn’t (and probably shouldn’t) be a 100% dreadful experience. Where’s the fun in that? Doesn’t leave much room to enjoy the journey.

I’m also not saying we should ignore our Amex limit and buy the new Gucci sandals in every color possible. Or that money doesn’t matter in terms of being able to fulfill goals such as travel or charity.

What I am saying, at the bottom of everything, is – none of it means shit unless we are happy and fulfilled by our achievements. What use is the house and the money and the glory if we wasted our soul and body away to get these things? In my opinion, not worth it at all.

While numbers can and do matter (especially in athletics), it’s important to listen to our bodies and take stock in how we feel. Even if that means slowing pace and not feeling like a lung will burst throughout that 5 miler. Like they say, slow and steady wins the race! You can’t finish if you give up halfway through!

And…GENDRY DIDN’T GIVE UP LAST NIGHT.

I cannot with Game of Thrones last night, how are we going to wait a whole year for the next season. How.

Happy Monday!

❤

lord love a duck | marathon monday week #14

“Lord love a duck” is one of my mother’s favorite sayings. I don’t really know what it means, except that she uses it when exasperated.

I personally think the literal interpretation of this phrase would be hilarious. I feel this way because I’ve had a recent obsession with ducks. I know, random. It started with a post on the Passenger Shaming Instagram account. For those that don’t know, it’s an account that features submissions of people being terrible airline travelers. The photo I’m talking about featured a very adorable service duck, on a plane, in BOOTIES.

See?

Guys…BOOTIES!! Obsessed.

From there, I did some research about the feasibility of owning a pet duck in Las Vegas. Guess what? It’s not feasible. On to Plan B, which entailed setting my text tone to the duck quack and going to Sunset Park to visit the ducks. I talked about my return to this sport a couple of weeks ago.

On Saturday morning, I let myself sleep in before embarking on the run of the day. The longer I sat in my chair drinking my coffee, the more time I had to attempt to talk myself out of running. But then I thought of the ducks. My ducks. I needed to go see these damn ducks. I couldn’t let them down.

To clarify, I am fully aware of the fact that I do not own these ducks. They are wild, majestic creatures that dwell in the lake at Sunset Park and I have no claim to them whatsoever. So why am I attached to them?

Maybe it’s because while I’m sitting on the side of the lake, post-run, watching them swim around doin’ their thang – I feel so peaceful. Perhaps it’s because this is the next best thing to making an irresponsible life decision to acquire one as a pet.

Either way, I learned this weekend that I LOVE the ducks. I don’t know what this has to do with running or even life for that matter. If I could pull anything from this revelation, I would say that finding a quiet moment is so important to balance out our busy, stressful lives. Discovering a place to come to peace could be a crucial step in the process that is getting through a week without threatening to murder a coworker (you know which one).

There’s a reason so many of our favorite authors went out into nature. To be a witness of such perfect stillness and beauty is nothing short of satisfying – and inspiring.

I hope you find a place of peace this week, especially if things start getting crazy. Or, like me, you are having a mild freak-out after seeing both this week’s and the preview for next week’s GAME OF THRONES. OMG.

Happy Monday!

❤

holy shit halfway check-in | marathon monday #13

this patron prickly pear marg was muy perfecto!

i got to see the killers last week live on jimmy kimmel! AMAZE.

“Holy shit.” Yeah, those are my exact thoughts on this topic. How did we get here so fast?! In 13 weeks, the big day will be real. So I thought it was time to check-in and see what I needed to adjust during this last half of training.

I’ve come to the realization that I do need to make this a more prominent part of my life because this is where the mileage begins to increase. In the coming weeks I will start running distances I’ve never reached before. I’m not afraid to admit it – that’s intimidating!

The only thing I can do is become obsessed with my training and do everything I can to contribute to this process and set myself up for success.

This is what I see looking back on the last thirteen weeks:

– Summer has been hectic! Between traveling and moving and music festivals, sometimes it’s been difficult to get all my workouts completed. Now that my schedule is clearing up, it’s going to be a lot easier to make this marathon a bigger priority.

– SLEEP. For sure, I need more of this shit. Then again, I could always use more sleep. This scenario is a little bit out of my control (I have some WEIRD ASS sleeping issues), but I can work harder to contribute to a better night’s sleep.

– Stretching. I can tell you right now that I do not make enough time for a proper warm up or cool down stretch. All I can tell myself about this one is…just DO. IT.

The marathon is a whole new distance, one that I’ve never run before. That means I need to constantly check-in and tweak my training and my approach. Which is a thing I can do.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

I want to close my “Holy Shit Halfway” Check-In with a quote that my Mom found in her local paper yesterday:

“Too many of us mistake the edges of our comfort zone for the limits of our endurance.” – Chris Huston (Journalist)

❤

changing our attitudes | marathon monday week #11

Sometimes Mondays can make you feel like our palm tree friend above. I hope y’all got a good laugh from this because I had to stand in the middle of a parking lot and get honked at least seven times to take this photo.

Anyway!

It’s really easy to look at Monday and the week ahead and fall over in pre-determined exhaustion. And it’s also really easy to look at a massive to do list on Monday morning and think “FUCK THIS. I’ll start tomorrow.” I’ve done this on more than one occasion. Lazy Monday turns into “Oh shit I’ve lost an entire 22 hours of usable, productive time” and then I spend the rest of the week playing catch-up. Not fun.

I’m the first to admit my procrastination tends to get the better of me. I usually thrive under pressure and I am absolutely addicted to the feeling of stress when racing against a deadline. I know, I’m a thrill seeker. Lol.

However, procrastination is one of those characteristics I am actively working to change. One way to combat procrastination, I’m finding, is to change my attitude about the tasks at hand. I make a to-do list for the week on Sunday before I go to bed so I can have as little anxiety as possible.

Patricio (my dad) likes to say “How do you eat an elephant? One bite at a time” and this is the attitude I try to keep in mind when looking at that massive to do list on a Monday morning.

Attitude makes a big difference and is quite possibly very close to being everything. But it’s nothing without momentum.

They say the way you spend your New Years is the way you spend the rest of your year. I say fuck that because New Years is the worst holiday. Instead I propose that the way you spend your Monday is the way you spend the rest of your week. Yes, that’s better – and much more relatable too.

So…how is this morning going for you? Did you wake up and dread the fact that it was Monday and hit snooze seven more times? Did you jump out of bed pretending to be a cast member of High School Musical and start singing about toast?

I can tell you that I am somewhere in the middle of these two frames of mind. I am a night owl by nature and a 9-5 job makes this impossible on a regular basis. (Side note: I never use the word “impossible” so this is like a rare jungle animal sighting.)

My mornings usually involve a motivating song as my alarm – currently Unforgettable by French Montana – and me giving myself a pep talk. Out loud. Possibly sounding like a crazy person. And what if my method doesn’t work? I turn into the person hitting snooze seven times – we’ve discussed this before.

So while it’s really easy to be the little palm tree that gave up, I’m working to be the little weird human that doesn’t. Starting with run one of the week done already this morning.

What are you doing?

flat like nebraska | marathon monday week #10

This is the most anti-climactic post in the world, so let’s just throw it out there right at the beginning: nothing went wrong last week with my training. Whee!

(Side Note – I’ve driven through the ENTIRE state of Nebraska four times in one year so I am most definitely qualified to call it flat. Also, it was a traumatic experience and I never want to go back again. Why TF is Jess talking about Nebraska?? Keep Reading.)

I had to adjust my run schedule because I spent the weekend in Idaho. As a result, I needed to get all four days in at the beginning of the week. And as my spoiler already informed you – I completed all four days of training successfully.

And it felt really good! It was nice to complete early morning runs and have the rest of my day free. A good morning session gave me energy and allowed me to accomplish more things that needed to get done. Like take out the trash.

Initially I thought, “I have nothing to talk about, everything went well last week.” But sometimes life just goes smoothly and that can be hard to get excited about.

When life is going to shit and everything is going wrong, it’s so easy to pick out those things and dwell on them. It can be easy to feel bad for ourselves, but it doesn’t feel good internally. It’s poisonous to our systems.

That’s why I find it so important to celebrate the things that do go right, even if they are just the little things. Matt Nathanson (how about a throwback for you??) once said he learned to get by on little victories and I quickly adopted that idea as my own.

My (not-so) little victory for the week? I MISSED running in the morning. It felt WEIRD to not workout before the sun came up.

I call that a success because who knew I could adopt that habit so quickly?? Certainly not me but I will TAKE IT!

It shows that we CAN change the negative patterns in our life. We DO have control over how our actions impact our lives! We can become people who WANT to run at four in the morning. Ok, maybe want isn’t the correct word, but you know what I mean.

We see life as full of ups and downs, but we rarely take time to appreciate the flat parts when we’re coasting. For example – I never used to appreciate a quiet, Saturday night at home, but now I see the benefits.

I think I’ve managed to change my own mind in this post, because, a week of training without injury or heatstroke? Not boring at all – more like something to appreciate.

Happy Monday!

forgive yo’self! | marathon monday week #9

Last week, I talked about needing to adapt my life to ensure I could fit in my training. I reflected on my almost perfect success in waking up at 4am to run. So I felt really good about going into the rest of last week in terms of running.

Well, Team…I’m here to tell you that I neglected to wake up to run three days in a row last week. On Tuesday, Wednesday and Thursday mornings, the alarm went off at 4am and I proceeded to click the Snooze button for the next hour (or two.)

In those moments, I surely did not have any self-control to discipline myself into getting my ass out of bed to work the program. Nope, none at all. I was perfectly content to listen to “24k Magic” every eight minutes for the next hour. (Yes, that’s my ringtone – I’m diehard for Bruno.)

So, I had to have a little pep talk with myself during Thursday night yoga. I wanted to cut the shit and make sure that I completed the training program to the best of my ability. Envisioning myself at the race in November, helped get me back on track. I don’t want to be there at the starting line unprepared. So I have to kick my own ass now. Easier said than done, right?

I don’t have a secret to forcing myself out of the bed in the morning to run (which I did for the rest of last week), but I can tell you it starts with forgiving yourself for failing in the past. And then moving on from it. And also talking to yourself, out loud. It’s fine. Totally fine.

Forgiveness of self is a big theme on this blog (like here!), and I think it’s crucial to carrying on with life. It takes practice and it certainly doesn’t come overnight. Even though I’ve gotten pretty good at not stressing about my shortcomings in the past, I will tell you it takes ongoing practice. There are times when I get major anxiety about the things I’ve failed at and can’t change. Whether it be a workout, shit I’ve said at work, shit I’ve done while out and about or anything else in between, sometimes it causes me anxiety.

I think that’s ok, however, because it allows us to all connect on a basic level: the human level. We are all humans and we will all make mistakes. We will have good days and bad days. We will succeed and we will fail. But at the end of the day, we are all humans.

So just keep in mind that no one is perfect and we’re all trying to live the best lives that we can! And always remember to forgive yourself…and sleep in whenever possible. : )

Happy Monday!

adapting | marathon monday week #8

If you’ve been paying attention to the weather lately, you know that it’s getting quite toasty – especially in Vegas. When the temperature gets up to 110, 115 or – my favorite – 120, I don’t particularly feel like running in the sun. However, I have to get those runs in because after that three week break, I am not doing that again haha.

So what happens now? Running after work when it gets the hottest is a no-go, plus, I hate a treadmill. HATE a treadmill. I can’t stand running in one spot, staring at the same, bleak landscape of my mediocre apartment’s grounds for longer than 20 minutes. I’ve even heard that running on a treadmill can be bad for the knees and as someone with geriatric knees to begin with, we don’t (k)nee(d) that. (Hahahaha I think I’m punny and hilarious. Moving on…)

But in this Vegas summer heat AKA Satan’s Asshole, sometimes that’s really the only option I have. I don’t want heatstroke or a sunburn or a trip to the hospital due to dehydration. In those cases when I have to treadmill it, I make sure my scheduled run is a speed run (where I’m trying to run as fast as I can for short distances multiple times), a tempo run (where I’m trying to maintain a certain pace for a shorter distance) or a run with short mileage.

Now you might be wondering “isn’t there a thing called a ‘long run'”?

Why, yes, yes there is such a thing. And I bet you’re wondering what I do in scenarios such as those. Well, Team, I have had to adapt. And by adapting I mean waking up at 4am to run before the sun fully breaks over the horizon. Which means I, your friendly neighborhood night owl, has been forced to learn how to go to bed early. 4am is the time you wake up instead of come home from the club? Oh. Oh boy.

In the interest of my sanity, these 4am wake-up calls don’t happen every morning, but last week I aimed for three of them and successfully completed TWO. That’s over 50%! After my long break, I’ll take it!

Look at me, “adapting.”

Adapting and being flexible are two things that go hand in hand while running, but they are also super important in life as well. How many times do we experience situations that we WERE NOT expecting. Additionally, how many of those scenarios take place when we’re trying to get somewhere or do something else? If your life is like mine, I’m guessing the answer is: quite a few.

Adapting applies to things on a micro level as well. What if the sun isn’t up but it is still so damn hot? Slow the pace and keep my breathing in check. What if I’m running up a hill? Slow the pace and relax my brain.

It’s easy for me to come up with solutions to these issues because I’ve been a runner for five years. I’ve seen and experienced many factors that can affect a run. While this is a “good for you Jess” moment, I will also be the first one to tell you that adapting in real is not this easy for me.

Life pivots and changes quickly without warning and while I’ve gotten some practice navigating these changes, I don’t think anyone is ever prepared for what life will throw at us (or how we will react).

What I can tell you with certainty is that having a positive attitude, an open mind and being flexible are the basics in the toolkit for venturing through this life. They are the only things I can confidently say will help get me through anything.

So more adventures from the other 4am club are sure to ensue, especially as the mileage increases. That hour brings all sorts of fantastic desert-dwellers out and about (don’t worry, I own pepper spray). Plus more crazy turns in life will come – that’s inevitable.

i just felt like i needed to include this – when life gets tough, come to me and i’ll tell you allll about the dead haha

Happy Monday Team! Adapting is tricky and we will never ever be experts at it. But like a famous high school once sang “We’re all in this together!”