Twenty Miles Of Punishment


Me and the other ROTS girls.
Drink all day. Play all night. I'm in Miami bitch! OK. So that may be a wee bit of an exaggeration cuz really I'm in Rocklin which is like 20 degrees hotter and about half the humidity. It may be a fucking inferno during the Summer but its a "dry heat" which should not be confused with a "dry heave" or a "dry hump" even though those two descriptions are pretty accurate for the Sacramento Valley in July. The Summer heat here is likely to make you want to hurl if you're running eleven miles of dusty, rocky canyon trails especially when you have to call your friend to come pick you up because you drank too much the night before partying it up with the neighbors and pretty much woke up still drunk, can't drive your own ass and need a ride to the trailhead. Yeah. I did that. My friend Matt was really cool about it even though picking up my drunk ass made him late to the group run HE organized. I felt kinda bad. 
20 miles of punishment.

Uggh. That was probably just about the shittiest eleven (maybe twelve or thirteen - we took a wrong turn somewhere) miles I ever ran still drunk. Well at least it was the shittiest until two weekends ago when Matt picked my ass up again (not drunk this time - I had to drive to Starbucks) on our way up to Polluck Pines to do twenty miles of mountain running at Run On The Sly.

But this time instead of starting off with my pre-drunken party still on I started Run On The Sly unusually sober. I was a very good girl. I hydrated the entire week prior, made my homemade gel, fueled myself up on a high carb breakfast, made sure I had my handhelds, electrolytes, bib number and morning poop all in order before race start. I felt like the stars were aligning for a great race. 

I couldn't have been more wrong.

So instead of wasting your valuable time waxing not-so-nostalgically about this race and why it sucked so bad I will just summarize. I'm feeling slightly A.D.D. right now... 


THINGS THAT WENT WRONG AT ROTS
  1. My left knee bugged me.
  2. I was constantly tripping.
  3. I twisted my left ankle a tad.
  4. I overcompensated with my right leg.
  5. I tried to adjust my downhill running form.
  6. I got a creeper cramp in my right inner quad.
  7. My ass hurt.
  8. I got a pokey thorn-thing in my left shoe.
  9. I stopped to get pokey thorn-thing out of my shoe and gave myself a charlie horse in my left hip.
  10. It was hot.
  11. My ass still hurt.


WHAT I SHOULD HAVE DONE

1. I should have eaten a good dinner the night before - The hubs made a nice tuna salad dinner. It was nice. Not very filling or hearty though. There wasn't much for the kids and they seemed hungry so I didn't eat a whole lot (which is HUGE for me because I've been known to eat their bacon when they're not looking.) I really should have stuffed my face like I did just before the Rodeo Valley 50k. 
That's not a baby. Its a burrito.


2. I should have NOT eaten such a HUGE breakfast race morning - I was so hungry from the night before I had three paleo pancakes, a large bowl of granola, 1 big banana, and a tall mocha from Starbucks. My stomach was full and I felt "off" at the start of the race.


At least I had time to take in the scenery.
3. I should have stretched and did more mobility - I've been back to work big time. If you're friends with me on facebook you'll notice I'm online ALL the time now. Working. Really. Ok. So I *may* be facebooking a teeny bit while working, but honestly I've been sitting in an office chair staring at a computer screen for a good 6 hours out of the day now. Ironically, I blame it on my coach. Not only has he not updated my workovers (hint, hint, SETH - if you're reading this) but I've been working my ass off on developing his website for his new gym, The Ranch Athletics, which will be opening sometime in early 2013. This is epic, people. He's gonna make some serious waves in the training and athletics industry. I just hope he can handle the success.

4. I should have NOT done back-to-back all out sprint days right after a week of no training - Lets face it. I'm no spring chicken and doing all out sprints is taxing on my body. My schedule was a bit messed up with my husband being in Downieville for about 4 days and the kids not being in school yet. I tried to make up all my workovers in a limited window of time and over-did it.

5. I should have NOT done those seated box jumps after my back-to-back sprint days - I could clearly feel my hamstrings were compromised from my sprints and I felt a slight pull in my left hamstring when trying to do seated box jumps during my workover the Wednesday prior to my race. I stopped halfway through the second set, but I could feel there was something wrong.

6. I should have NEVER tried to adjust my running form with a crap knee
 - I should have just walked because changing my form wasn't going to do shit to help the tightness in my knee. All it did was give me a creeper cramp. You know? The beginning of a lock-up where you feel the muscle tightening but it hasn't started hurting yet. But seeing as this race was either all uphill or all downhill and I wanted to run I didn't have a choice (in my head.) When my knee starts bugging me I have a tendency to think I can fix it mid run. Who am I fooling?

7. I should have NEVER tried to remove the pokey thing from my shoe - I was literally 2 miles from the finish line and my feet are tough enough to hang with sharp jabby bits for 2 fucking miles.

8. I clearly should have drank more beer post race - A day like this deserves more beer. Enough said.
Dirty Girl. Cold Beer.



Seriously. This race took a lot out of me. I finished in 4:30 which wasn't too bad considering my issues and the course but still it was a hard pill to swallow. I've been slacking lately and I felt it. But for all the crappiness this race had to offer me there was one small sliver of happy-happy-joy-joy that occurred.

I finally perfected the art of peeing while standing up!!!

That's right.

I was hesitant to pull off trail around mile 5 for fear that the after-pee-drippage might cause chafing for the last 15 miles. This has happened to me before and it only took about a mile for the chafing to become truly painful. I had left the body glide in my backpack. In Matt's truck.

Turns out a good strong stream and a little forward lean with a wiggle and a shake at the end totally did the trick. I was very proud of myself. If I could have high fived myself I would have. I think Matt was a little disturbed when I described (in detail) my accomplishment. Oh well. Dude's gonna have to deal with that if he runs with me.

So the pain and discomfort of this last run just makes me realize I've got to train really hard to get myself where I want to be to do that 100 miler I'm planning. I will do it, but with working more I have to find a balance. I've been finding it hard to be motivated lately especially when I have to do speedwork and its 106 degrees outside. But, I'd rather suck it up than lose anymore ground.

So my plan will be (as soon as I get Seth's website live and running) to get motivated and work hard. Oh and find shoes. Preferably zero drop 100 miler shoes.

And do a Zaps Threads giveaway... Yup. I'll keep you all posted on that. Trust me. I'm VERY close.
. . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 




Comments

  1. Just so we are clear I did not advocate doing those back to back speed work days haha and I will get you some new workouts:). And as for your chair at work, get rid of it

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. I know you didn't. But I was gonna get 'er done. I've got to stop doing that. And the chair? I would need a standing desk, which I can't afford. I do move my computer out to the kitchen every so often when my work doesn't require total concentration but haven't done so lately because a certain gym's website requires WAY too much concentration. :-)

      Delete
  2. So what I got out of this is you should drink more before you run:)???

    I kind of had a feeling you were going to have a tough day out there based on the workouts you had done and then the knee tweaking pretty much right out of the gate.

    That said you toughed it out, which actually worried me a bit as I did not want you to injure yourself out of some duty you felt to run that thing with me. That was not an easy day out there....for anyone.

    Peeing standing up was great...even other women were impressed (you were telling everyone near us...). Hell, I was impressed. That had me thinking for a couple of miles.

    Bottom line: it was a tough fun day out there and we live to run another day!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. You're right. It was a tough day for everybody. Had no idea there was such a thing as a cramping epidemic. Crazy shit. Hope Angie's body has fully recovered from that.

      Delete
  3. Sorry I missed you. I had two beers waiting for you but I guess I didn't calculate the times right. We ended up leaving around 11:30am since my buddy that I drove up with had to get going. Next time!

    ReplyDelete
    Replies
    1. Hope you had a great run, dude! We'll catch up at another run. Let me know how the Merrell's worked out for you.

      Delete
  4. No problems with the Trail Gloves. I've signed up for the Down and Dirty so maybe I'll see you there!

    ReplyDelete

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