Mother Racer

I slept in today and then went on a short shakeout run. I only ran 24:25.08. I ended off with 3 fast strides. I have my 1/2 marathon race tomorrow… After today’s run I realized I am going to be hurting. 🙂 I started my hard speed this week with a double speed in a row. Well tomorrow should be interesting. Oh well… This race is all part of a workout plan.
I spent all morning cleaning and packing… The girls (my 4) and I are driving to St. George right after school. Z (our Foriegn exchange student) left for a girl’s “camp” (in a cabin) for our church.

I picked up Amber D (my running friend) after I dropped Z off and we drove to St. George. It was a long drive… The girls were on one today. Poor Amber. 🙂 We walked around the expo after we picked up our packets…

The girls were a little hyper after the car ride (it is about a 3 1/2 hour drive)…

The hotel room added to their excitement and going to bed 2 hours past their bedtime didn’t help any. 🙂

Good times! Corom and our friend Mike are driving up in the morning to run the 5k… Corom is pushing the girls in a stroller. 🙂

It was a beautiful day out for a nice run…

I sent the kids out on a 6 mile run with the last 800 (1/2 mile) at a fast, hard run.

This was a new route that one of the boys on the team found. It is a combination of the many different routes we have.

The kids enjoyed it. They ran well today. It is hard to keep them motivated during in-door track… So it is nice to have different routes with different terrain…

They finished off their workout with strides and leg hops and then stretching. This is our foreign exchange student learning how to use blocks… 🙂

For dinner we had our neighbors over (the Morris’s). It was her (the mom’s) birthday. It was fun! She has amazing children and her and her husband are really good people! They have been through so many trials in their life that they have inspired me to get through mine! They are one of a kind and I am so grateful we are neighbors!

So Corom came out of our room ready to relax for the evening…

He was wearing a nice little snuggie he picked up at the St. George marathon. Someone was getting rid of it so he picked it up. Good find!

I planned on sleeping in this morning until 5:45 am… Of course my kids got up at 5:30. 🙂 Good thing I went to bed at 10 last night. I met up with Rachelle and Amber in Payson at 6:15 and ran a 7 mile loop. I felt a lot better than I thought I would considering this week being my 1st week of speed. My legs were a little tight and sore but we went and ran without pushing it. It was a nice run. We finished the 7 in 53:39.41. My body was happy with me to take an easier day. I will do 100-150 sit-ups/crunches and 30 push-ups but that is about it for strength training.

I took my 3rd child to her speech class this morning (along with my youngest and 2 others I watched today)… It went really well, better than I expected…

My 3rd worked on her speech while the other 3 kept themselves occupied. Very nice! A little after lunch I accumulated a few more kids… 7 to be exact and then my 3. 🙂 It was a little loud and crazy at times but fun today… Some days I’m a little more patient than others and today was a good day to be on for my patience.

Which was good to have an “on” day today because I also had scouts today. 5 boys and launching off rockets… Can they get a little more excited? 🙂

Corom works late tonight, so after the girls, Z (our Foriegn exchange student) and I had dinner and the girls went to bed (at 7), I sat down on the couch and watched a Christmas movie I recorded (Z did homework). It was nice. 🙂

I met up with Mac, Aubrey and Holly at 5:15 this morning in 13 degree weather. It was a full moon and gave me some light. 🙂

We started off and ran a 18 minute warmup. Holly continued on with her run and Mac and Aubrey ran 3 out of the 6 hill loops with me. It was almost .7 miles for the loop. I began my repeat with a .1 slight downhill. The next .1 was a slight uphill and the next .3 miles was a steep hill. I ran up this

Then the road curved left and took me up another little steep hill…

Then the road curved right and shot me up another steep hill…

Once I reached the top, I went into a recovery jog for about .17 miles down this steep downhill…

As I stated above, it is almost .7 mile (a little more than a 1/2 mile). The 1st 3 loops it took about 3 1/2 min of tempo pace and 1 min recovery (4 1/2 min total). The last 3 loops were about 4:45 minutes. My arms were sore from trying to drive up the hill, my legs felt like jello and I actually felt a little nauseous my last one. Call me weird but I like feeling that way during a hard workout. It was a total of 27 min of the hill repeats, with recovery time included in that. I ran a cool down of 25 min with about 15 min at a moderate pace (7:15 pace maybe) then slowed down the last 10 min once I got close to my car (I ran into Beth, Amber and Trish and ran with them the last 10 min). I ran a total of 1:10.06. I did my leg hops 2×50 (100 total on each leg), then drove down to South Valley Gym and spent 10 minutes there.

I did the Lat Pull Down machine (thanks Lily)… Same as yesterday. I did switch the weight to 50lbs instead of 60 because my arms were sore. 4×10 with it behind and 2×10 with me pulling the bar in front. (See the importance of leg hops and these weights I did today and yesterday on yesterday’s mile repeats work out…)

I moved to the pull-up machine next and did 2×10 pull-ups (with the weight on 60lbs… it helps to have the weights on for people like me that have no upper body strength).

I was home by 7, stretched a little…

Thanks Sarah… Runningonhealthy.com for this stretch! It has helped me a lot. And I’m probably doing it wrong. 🙂 Did a little core (about 100 sit-ups…) and then had to start the morning routine of getting kids, my husband and myself ready for school, work and whatever! I finished off my dress attire with compression socks and ice…

Good times and let the day begin!