Sunday, October 5, 2008

Quick Portland Marathon Report

Whew! After not feeling well in the days ahead of the run and my Garmin batteries being dead and having to go naked without a watch, I sure did well! I went into the race thinking I would have to walk a lot due to not feeling well. I felt great! The weather was a bit sprinkly but pleasant. I didn't have a clue what my times were the entire race, but knew Iwas feeling well and ahead of the 4:15 pacer, but behind the 4:00 pacer. I ended up crossing the finish line with the clock reading 4:04:45, I knew I was under that beacuse of where I started. I was happy because I thought I at least matched my best time of 4:04. I was shocked (and am still shocked)when I found out I actually finished in 3:58! Whoo Hoo! I finally broke the 4 hour barrier! It was awesome! I had a great time! Praise God! Quick thanks to George K. for surprising me around mile 21 (?) You pumped me up to finish strong!
Grace and peace to you!

Thursday, October 2, 2008

Panther Running Club

Well, new for me this year is having both of my kids in the YMCA before and after school care program. This means that I don't have to rush out of school to pick up the kids by 3:30pm. So I decided to start a noncompetitive running club at my High school.

We had an interest meeting a couple of weeks ago and 5 kids showed up! I was thrilled. Last Thursday was our first run. Again, 5 kids showed up, but two of them were new! Two others weren't at school that day. We had discussed that we would use the walk-run method to build up into running 3 miles. The kids are at varying levels so I decided we would stay on the track. We are using pretty much the Cool Running: Couch to 5k program. We warmed up with 5 minutes or walking, We ran a 200, walked a 200, ran 400, walked 400 then repeated. Then a cool down walk to the bus! The kids were very enthusiastic! Today is run number two! I can't wait!

I'll post again this afternoon with an update!

So, now it's 5:20pm instead of am when I wrote this morning. I had 8 kids today!! Two new today too! It was great. We ran/walked for a total of about 2.25 miles. I had some of the kids move to run the straights walk the corners after they took the first 5 minute run too fast. All in all, the kids are enjoying themselves and we are having fun!

On to The Portland Marathon on Sunday. I'm feeling a little fall allergyish and might take the day off tomorrow to rest up. I about lost my voice by the end of the day today and feel like an interesting evening of Vice presidential debate and hot tea and sleeping in on Friday might do the trick!

Grace and peace to you!