Week 5: & 6, 7, et al.

In the hub-bub of marathon training, working full time, studying for the GRE, and trying to maintain a social life that allows me to still have friends, I've been a real slacker on writing any of it down. I am technically down to week 5 right now, but would like to recap the last week and half of training:

7:26 pace 18 miler on 4/12: Laps Around Lake Merit, Oakland

Week 8: Ragnar SoCal Race Recap

Can we talk about how time isn't obeying any kind of normal metric and is instead flying past in complete disarray? ...okay, that's a bit dramatic; but really, time is on the move and training days are zooming along. So without further ado, I would like to share my 2014 Ragnar SoCal race recap:


What is Ragnar SoCal? I'm glad you asked! Our race covered 195 miles, beginning in Huntington Beach and ending at the convention center in downtown San Diego. My lovely team included 11 other crazy runners, with each of us taking on 3 legs of the 36 leg race. The race is basically structured like a batting order: once you run your leg, everyone else on the team has to run one of theirs before you start over. Essentially, we ran in order 1 - 12 three times in a row.

I was runner #3 (and therefore runner #15 and #27) for our team, afterNUUN run. As a proud member of Van 1, I joined the likes of Keith, Kristina, Chris, Wes, and Erin -- some of the most badass runners around -- for a 26+ hour adventure in a mini-van. The second half of our team, cozily jammed into Van 2, was comprised of Alisyn, Matt, Meg, Bruce, Miriam, and Paulette -- each of which are even more impressive, hilarious, and fit than even their Strava accounts and blogs allude to.

There is enough adventure packed into this nearly 200 mile, 2 hours of sleep, half marathon or more running per person extravaganza to fill a novel, so I'm going to spare you the gory details and go into a photo montage with minimal commentary instead:

Van 1 LOVE! The gang showing off our Ragnar race tees, Zensah calf sleeves, and Nuun bottles

The San Francisco Marathon Post: 7 Wonderful & Little-Known Benefits of Running

I'm proud to share with you all my post from The San Francisco Marathon blog page! See the official posting: HERE.

Graphic borrowed from The SF Marathon Blog

7 Wonderful and Little-Known Benefits of Running

So you’ve made it to The SF Marathon blog page — a hearty congratulations to you! You must already know that running is a wonderful, magical, superhuman barrel of fun, right? You plan your weekends around going to bed early and racing the sunrise to the highest points within 20 miles of your house, right? At a moments notice, you can name your exact personal best time in every distance from a 5k to a 50-miler, right? Okay, okay, maybe you’ve only been running one time ever. Maybe your brother / sister / significant other / best friend / boss / mother-in-law is a runner and you’re pining to know the secrets of their emphatical joy. Well, you’re in luck; whether you’re an elite runner or a curious novice, this post is for you. I give to you: 7 Wonderful & Little-Known Benefits of Running.

1. Running Improves Joint Cartilage — For ALL Ages

Wait, isn’t running bad for “older” people? HA! The wives’ tale that running damages the knee / ankle / hip joints is about as accurate as saying that a woman’s body can’t handle running a marathon. And just as Katherine Switzer showed us in the 1967 Boston Marathon, sometimes conventional “knowledge” is far from true. According to a 2013 study of osteoarthritis and hip replacement risk, “long-distance running does not increase the risk of osteoarthritis of the knees and hips for healthy people,” and “might even have a protective effect against joint degeneration.” Whoa! The New York Times also covered this phenomenal phenomenon here.