Rock n' Run

As many of you know, I'm slightly a freak about Milwaukee Adventure Boot Camp (Go Elmbrook girls!). Well, this Saturday a bunch of us girls are going to be running the Rock N' Run to benefit the United Way of Greater Milwaukee and the United Performing Arts Fund. Since, this race is only a 3K and you get two complimentary MGD 64 beers, so it's not exactly a serious race. As a semi-serious runner and fan of the arts and beer, I think this is going to be super fun.
IF you read this and are inspired by running, the arts, or beer, this is the race for you! I will be meeting up with the Boot Camp group on the steps of the Senior Center/Muellner Building at Hart Park at 10:30 a.m. You are welcome to join us!

Details from 102.9 The Hog:
It’s THE HOG's MGD 64 ROCK N' RUN, presented by Rogans Shoes and Michalski Chiropractic!

A 3K fun run / walk with 2 complimentary MGD 64s after the race (21 years of age or older)! Proceeds benefit the United Way of Greater Milwaukee and United Performing Arts Fund.

The ROCK N' RUN happens at 11am on Saturday, May 1st at Hart Park in the ‘Tosa Village. There will be no "day of" registration. Sign up by 5 p.m. to get in!

Every runner & walker gets a commemorative ROCK N' RUN t-shirt and 2 complimentary MGD 64s after the race (21 years of age or older). It's all for the low low donation of $25 (did we mention it's a chip time event)!

Post Race enjoy food from Mr. Picnic and Streetza Pizza, plus ice cold Miller from Leff’s LuckyTown (like the new Aluminum Miller Lite Pints just $4 each).

THE HOG's House Band Black Frog will play after the run.

Brainstorm in June!

Hello everyone!

A good friend of mine, Melissa, has a brother who has Epilepsy. After she did a presentation on this disease and the Epilepsy Foundation for a class back in college, I've donated to her team every year. This year I am going to join her team Jay-Walkers (named so for her brother Jason), and run in Brainstorm 2010 as part of my 5K challenge. Brainstorm will be my June race on the 27th at Veteran's Park near the lakefront.

Epilepsy is the medical term used to describe the more than 20 types of seizures. Epilepsy can affect ANYONE, at ANY AGE, at ANY TIME. There are 30,000 individuals affected by epilepsy in our four county Southeast Wisconsin area (Milwaukee, Waukesha, Ozaukee, and Washington) and 44-50% of those diagnosed with epilepsy are NOT medically controlled at this time. From the the Foundation's website:

The Epilepsy Foundation of Southeast Wisconsin is dedicated to improving the quality of life for all those affected by seizure disorders/epilepsy through education, direct services, advocacy and the support of research for the prevention and cure of epilepsy. We are the only agency specifically organized to serve the diverse and special needs of the 10,000 children and 20,000 adults with epilepsy in Milwaukee, Ozaukee, Waukesha and Washington counties. An additional 100,000 family members may also require epilepsy-related services.

Please help me help Melissa and her family support the Epilepsy Foundation of Southeast Wisconsin to bring help and hope to individuals affected by seizure disorders! I've met Jason and he is an amazing person! Their whole family is amazing! Check out my fund-raising site to pledge some dollars if you can. You can join Melissa's team too if you'd like and run with us! Thanks for all your support and reading my blog! Oh, by the way, I still don't have a May run picked out. Suggestions? Help!

Exercise High and Running for the Alma Mater

Hello folks who I've sorely neglected for about a month,

First off, please allow me to apologise for my lack of posts. I should really get more on top of that, but life happens. Also, summer is going to be nuts with running, horseshoes, softball and volleyball. Eek!

Second, I've started up training again with Milwaukee Adventure Boot Camp (LOVE) in Elm Grove. While my schedule and finances do not allow me this treat more than a few times a year, I'm so stoked to be back. I'm waking up at 4:30 a.m. (Crazy? Why, yes!) to drive over to Mary Knoll Park and get my butt kicked for an hour (5:30 - 6:30 a.m.). We literally don't stop moving the entire time. We do lunges, plank holds, sprints, squats, kicks, band exercises, weight exercises, stretching, running, hills, bear crawls and more. There are even a few exercises that we have renamed funny things like "the naughty housewife" and the "boob lifter".

While it is kind of ridiculous to get up so early and run around like a crazy person, it is a huge boost to my exercise routine. Plus, a ton of people that were in my classes back in fall are still there this spring and we're all just so happy to see each other! When I first signed up a lot of people lovingly asked, "are you nuts?" to which I replied, "apparently." Then they saw how fit and happy I was, so now I get lots of "babe, look at your calves!" which makes me extremely happy. (That and when I wore a skirt that made the BF say "whoa...") I know that your self worth is not in how you look, but based on your personality/soul instead. However, my soul is doing cartwheels with all this energy I have! Then again, that energy is gone and I'm snoozing by about 9 p.m. for the next 4 weeks. Ha!

Finally, I have some more happy news! I took off another 32 seconds from my 5k time! That's right! Running Gary's Gallop on April 17 was a lot of fun, although super windy. This event is to help the athletic programs at Wisconsin Lutheran College - my college, sweet college. I loved going and seeing all the smiling Warrior faces. Tons of students, alumni, alumni kiddos, and community members were there to run the very hilly course. Even my church's 5K Klub was out with a good showing.

I ran with my friend Tammy who was on the WLC Cross Country team. I kept up with her for about the first mile and a half, but she was still going strong when one of the hills took it's toll on me and my side. I had to slow down a bit, but was pretty excited about my mile times. My favorite part of this race is that you do your last 500 meters or so by running around the track and then a dash down the center of the field to the finish line. It's like running for a touchdown! At the finish line, my friend Brian who is also on the Alumni Committee with me gave me a high five... and then patted my head... silly man.

While the formal results aren't posted yet, I can tell you that my friend Angie won 2nd place for our age group and that my time for this run back in 2008 was 35:01. Man, that makes 31:29 feel even better!

Up next: No idea. Suggestions for May anyone?

To the back, to the back!

Dear runners who are slower than me (if that's possible) and walkers and people with strollers at 5k events,

MOVE TO THE BACK OF THE GROUP AT THE START LINE.

I would like you to take note of the statement that I so very rudely put in all capital letters. My co-workers and I had a discussion on slow runners and walkers today. Part of our jobs are to set up and make sure that 5K fundraisers go smoothly. We get annoyed by (and worried for) the ba-zillion people who think that they should be at the very front of the start line.

Here are a few reasons why:

1. We don't want you to get hurt. Hard-core runners who are there for qualifying times or want to win "fastest" awards will mow you down. Please look around you and find someone who you suppose is about your same fitness level and start near them.


2. We want to make sure that people who are there for qualifying times don't get tripped up by people who "just want to see the start" and then don't move back. Again, they will trample you.


3. We care about the safety of your children. That's right. I'm talking to you lady with the baby/toddler in the running stroller. I know you're probably one hot mama and can run way faster than me, but please don't stand at the very start. People will run right over you or dart in front of the stroller requiring you to jerk the stroller in a motion that I'm sure is not either comfortable or safe for your kiddo.


4. As a runner, nothing sucks more than starting behind someone who you guessed to be much faster, but who has decided to fiddle with their MP3 player or shoelaces or whatever at the very last minute. Then you jog along like you don't know what you're doing and you cause problems for those around you, which again, is not safe.


5. If you don't back up, it ends up like this (Thanks to Failblog.org):

Really, we want you to be safe. If you aren't sure how fast you are, it's never wrong to start a little farther back than you think and then move up during that first quarter mile. We don't want a jumble of people crashing together causing all sorts of problems and injuries. Also, it's really annoying. Please act accordingly.

Thank you,

Me

Full of Blarney!

What a crowd we had! I don't just mean the nearly 1,000 people at the 19th Annual Blarney Run/Walk, but I met up with/saw so many people I knew! I found Sarah (pink bandana) before the race like we planned, and she had her friends Josh and Becky with her (see attractive people on the right in the photo below).

I also met up with my friend Rulena from church and she started the race with us. Sarah had never done a 5K before, but she did a great job finishing at 34 minutes flat (according to the official posted results thanks to the Badgerland Striders). I finished just ahead of her at 32:42. Becky, Josh and Rulena all finished in the 20's.

The race was very hilly along the Underwood Parkway and Swan Boulevard. I had a very slow first mile because you really had to jockey to get to an open space to hit your stride. The second one was downhill but I got a stitch in my side so I could really lengthen my stride too much. The third mile was mostly uphill and that really divided people. You could tell who still had some fire in them and pushed through strong. Others gave their all in the first two miles and got passed by the fired-up people. I can gladly say that I finished strong and passed quite a number of people in mile three. I was hoping to finish faster, but oh well. Next time!

Pros of the event: it was well-organized, I had lots of friends to run with, great cause, good food afterward, clear results and had great volunteers! The Wauwatosa Historical Society raised about $20,000 for their projects including the roof on the Kneeland Walker House which is leaking badly (HINT! HINT!).

Cons of the event: uphill last mile, bottleneck at the turnaround and the finish line, people who don't know how to line up for a race.

The pros win (as they always do).

Luck o' the Run

I just looked at my last month's entry and CANNOT believe I let this go this long. I faithfully maintain another blog for my day job, and am sorry to have left this blog alone for nearly a full month. However, the timing of the run/walk events is practically exactly a month a part since this Saturday, March 13 will be The 19th Annual Blarney Run!

I have never been what you call a "lucky" person since I don't really believe in luck, but this all just seems a little coincidental. A run scheduled to be a part of St. Patrick's Day, a holiday where we celebrate a lot of everything about a country where people are stereotypically superstitious, on the 13th? I really hope 13 turns out to be my number on Saturday! I REALLY want to break the 30 minute mark, but we'll see.

So, how about some information on the race? It's the same starting spot as the 8K that I ran last month so no worries about finding it, and the course is very similar. Downhill, uphill, downhill, uphill, finish! Why is the finish line always uphill? Can't it be flat?

The Blarney Run/Walk is set up as a fundraiser for the Wauwatosa Historical Society, which is housed in the Kneeland Walker House (about a block from my family's house). The WHS does many wonderful things for the city including holding the history of Tosa, maintaining a library of records, revitalized the Little Red Store (which has a community bike rental program coming this summer!), and restoring the beautiful murals hidden behind the walls of the original entrance to Wauwatosa High School (now Wauwatosa East High School). These are only a few of their projects. They just had an event on some of the founding families of Wauwatosa that I went to with Mom, Debbie, and Kathy and learned all about the Hart's, Wheeler's, Warren's, and that where our house is used to be a lake. Who knew?

A new and exciting development is that one of my childhood friends (Hi Sarah!) has now taken up running and is going to meet me at the race! While we're not sure if we'll be on pace with each other, we can at least start the race together. Correct me if I'm wrong Sarah, but her goal this year is to run a marathon! A MARATHON! I'm so impressed! I don't know if she remembers this, but when I was a kiddo and had a bunch of surgeries on my foot, Sarah was a very good friend and patiently walked around my block with me while I re-learned how to walk. At the time, we were just two little girls being silly and taking walks, but really, it was a great way to do physical therapy and we probably didn't even notice it. Now we get to run a race together! Hopefully, I'll remember my camera and we can snap a few photos to share with you all.

As always, I'll report back after the race on Saturday and let you all know how it went. Hopefully, I'll have some good news about my time! Thanks to all my friends and family who keep an eye on this blog. It's fun to share this challenge with you!

Because it would feel wrong not to say it, wish me luck!

58:02 Baby!

Hello all!
You'll be happy to know that not only did I find the race location, show up with ample time before the race, make a new friend, and create a make-shift ponytail hat, but I finished the race in under an hour! If you're a repeat reader, you'll know that I signed up for the Steve Cullen Health Heart Club Run awhile back and was thinking, "8K, pssssh, that's totally doable!" Then it got closer and closer and then it was today! Eeep.

I practiced my long distance running at my friendly YMCA and did some weight training because I knew there would be hills, but WHOA, this was harder than I thought.

First off, let me tell you that the ponytail hat rocked. It kept my head warm and my hair out of the way. I had a couple of other runners mention it. Whooot! I cheated a bit and instead of sewing around the edges like I mean to do, I just snipped a hole in the back about where my ponytail would be. Wearing it also helped keep my iPod earbud in place (I only race with one in so I can hear other runners). Like I said, it rocked!

Second, I didn't train for as long as I should have. While I'd like to blame the signs posted in the Y that say "Usage on all cardio machines is limited to 30 minutes!", I know that it's mostly me going to the Y late at night and saying "2+ miles is long enough." I took my average mile time, added a minute or so and then guessed that I would like to finish in about an hour since an 8K is about 5 miles. Then in a slight panic, I checked out last year's race times to make sure that they kept timing that long (5K events usually cut off between 45 minutes and a hour). Yay for me they time until 1 hour and 20 minutes!

Race day comes and I don my spiffy new hat, layers of shirts, running capri tights and then track pants because IT WAS COLD! The friendly weatherman said the high today was 25 degrees F, which means while I was running in the morning was probably around 20 degrees or less. *shiver*

So I drive over there with plenty of time and park in the WLC lot because it's close and free! This other lady, Suzette, climbs out of her car once she sees that she's not the only one to park there. We become fast friends (no pun intended), and walk to the race together to pick up our snazzy t-shirts, race numbers and assorted goodies from the sponsors and Badgerland Striders who were big supporters of this race.

While we're walking, she's telling me about how her sister-in-law keeps her signing up for races and then backs out so she's so glad to have met me. She's so nice! She's also paranoid that she won't finish the race. Suzette doesn't believe she's a good runner. She's wrong.

We get all settled and head out to the race start line with our music and timing apparatuses (apparati?) and she's freaking out a little. Suzette, if you ever read this, please know that you're awesome. I tried keeping her calm and saying that if we should get separated, she should just try her hardest. The horn goes off and after saying good luck to each other, the woman takes off! Like lightening!

The first mile is up hill (boo), and by the first turnaround on Swan Blvd., I say hi to Speedy Suzette and shout out a few encouragements to the really fast people, and then quickly realize that it's me and a bunch of people older than my parents. That's right, I'm running with the AARP crowd. First off, kudos to them because I'm sure when they were my age, they were super fast. Second, they have lots of good tips and aren't afraid to share them with a friendly 26-year-old woman who is trying to not slip on the snow. Gotta love people! Runners are generally a friendly bunch. I think it's the endorphins.

Miles 2-4 are pretty level (map of course), but slippery due to the snow and I only had to jump out of the way of one dude trying to pass another once. The sun was shining, the volunteers were cheerful, and the water stops were perfectly placed. It was a beautiful February morning. After cheering on Suzette as she whipped past me after the second turnaround, I knew I had to pick up the pace or the AARP crowd was really going to show me what for.

Suddenly, my old exercise Boot Camp instructor's voice came in my head. "When you think you can't do any more, do 5 more. When you think you can't hold on any longer, count to 30. When you think you can't go faster, pick up your feet and do it," Sandi said. I listened and soon I was passing people at the end of mile 3. Mile 4 looked easy-peasy until my side-ache hit. "Nooooo!" was my only thought. I hadn't had to slow down at all and I had just passed people. Darn it.

Fortunately, I kept ahead of my AARP crowd with only 1 of them passing me during the uphill mile 4. That last mile was a killer, but when I crossed the finish line and saw my official time overhead, I was such a happy camper! After getting through the alleys at the end of the race, I met up with one of my AARP crowd who told me that he's been running for over 40 years. AWESOME! He was so encouraging, I felt so good about my time. I met up with Suzette in Wil-O-Way building, grabbed some Cullen Family Chili and then we walked back to our cars.

Now, I sit here in bed writing this and waiting for some Advil to kick in. I love running, but perhaps the 5ks are the way to go. That or no more running in snow. We'll see. Either way, it was an exhilarating way to spend a chilly February morning!

Next up: The Blarney Run.