Went running outside today in Houston, and stumbled upon the cutest street in the world. I am running there everyday this week, just so I can look at all of my dream houses the whole time. Everyone at the hotel thought I was crazy "to go out in this weather". Grant you, it's 30 degrees here and raining so Texans don't know what to do with themselves. Everything is shut down, stores are out of food, and it's about to start snowing.....The world is ENDING!

Found a few photo's from AutoShow Shuffle: ( to be uploaded soon)
1. Me pulling up my pants at the start line....haha
2. Almost finished

Correction to the race Schedule below:
Feb 2nd- groundhog run was cancelled. In it's place I have signed up for the super5K, which has a superbowl theme. You get a medal, a pint glass, and a BEANIE :) that's right! See ya'll there. ( when in texas...speak like a texan)

#2 AutoShow Shuffle 5K

1.18.14~ AutoShow Shuffle 5K--Detroit, MI

HOLY FREEZING this morning!!! I think it was 6, but it felt like -60, and my feet were asleep until 1/2 way through. However... I DID NOT STOP RUNNING today. This is the first time I have done a 5K (since college) that I ran the entire thing without stopping. My time was 36.17, so a minute faster than last week. Super proud of that accomplishment alone.

Detroit is really pretty in the morning when the sun is coming up. And the race path was great. All of the roads were salted, no icy spots, and the lineup of food at the end was clutch. Chocolate Milk is delicious!!!

Below are some photo's from this morning.


This is right afterwards...super pretty sunrise :)

 The Ice looked really cool. Marna was telling me about how when the ice moves over each other it makes this really cool sound, which I didn't hear at this point in the race because I had my headphones in. However...I did hear it on the last leg. And...it did sound really cool.

 Good Morning Canada!

 This says 36:41, but my real time was 36:17

Chocolate Milk!! Yum

GroundHog 5K is Feb 3rd....so I have a little break until then :)

2 down....28 to go :) :) :) :)

I met someone pretty cool today. Her name is Emily Schaller. By meet..I mean that she gave me my bib number and t-shirt at the packet pickup for the Auto Show Shuffle. She is also the founder of Rock CF and helps organize the running races on Grosse Ile.

Turns out Emily has Cystic Fibrosis and I had no idea what that disease was until today. I read about her, and the disease on her blog and decided she is my new role model for the year. Apparently running is a tremendous health boosting activity for people with CF. It helps to clear up the lung function by clearing out mucus. Running has increased her lung function 20-30% which is amazing.

Anyway...The Charity that "the auto show shuffle", "groundhog 5K", and "Rock CF 1/2 marathon" support is her non profit called "Rock CF" and it goes towards research for CF.

Hopefully some sunrise pic's along the river-walk to come tomorrow...

Happy Friday!

3 days until Race #2:

Super Shitty work week = Super amazing workouts!

Work has been terrible this week, and my swim workout really helped my emotional state of being yesterday. I find swimming to not only be super challenging because it's just F'ing hard, but I find that it helps me to ONLY think about swimming. I'm not on a treadmill or running outside looking at the dirty slush, or thinking about how hard my lungs are working. I'm just literally trying not to drown. So anyway...that's my promotion that swimming is really good for me. That's all :)

Looking forward to race #2 on Saturday. Doing it solo again. It's along the riverwalk in detroit and from the pictures from last year it looks pretty great!

#1 Flash Frozen 5K

1.11.14~FLASH FROZEN~ Monroe, MI

• 5K Time: 37:21
• Placed 3rd in Age Group ( woo hoo ) might have only been 3 in my age group, but this was a great accomplishment in my book, that's for sure.

I got to the race at 9am, and was parked in the wrong parking lot. I thought for about 30 minutes that I was going to turn around and just run my "own" race. I started home, and then thought that was ridiculous. Turned back around and found that I was in the wrong lot...found the correct spot and registered very easily. This race, as small as it was, was very organized, staff was great, ton's of prizes (probably like 30) and about 50 racers is my best guess.

It was about 40 degrees this morning, raining, super foggy, and honestly pretty great weather for running. I felt rather sluggish since I've been pretty sick, but about 12 minutes in, I felt a little better. Also was getting a little cramping, which never happens, so I took a few walk breaks for about 1 minute each ( I think 3 in total).

This is a link to the Monroe news which covered the race and there are a few "action photos" LOL
http://monroenews.smugmug.com/Flash-Frozen-5K-RunWalk/i-HzcnMZG

Below are a few photo's from this morning, along with my T-shirt and medal for placing 3rd!

 

Next Up..... Race #2 ~AutoShow Shuffle 5K. Stay tuned!

First Race is in 2 days!!! AHHH!! Thankfully it's just a 5K.
My first of 30 races is this Saturday. I've been down with a pretty bad cold/ holed up in my house since the 12 inches of snow we got last weekend...total bummer. But I'm super excited to get started on this 2014 journey. My training schedule has me up to running 25 minutes at a time, so that is my plan for Saturday. Run 25 minutes and then if I need a little breather to take one, and then finish up strong. Pictures, and Time to come soon... wish me luck :) My Fried Eli is training right now for a 1/2 Ironman and posting her workouts on facebook every day. She is becoming super inspirational to my training schedule as well.