There is officially one week until my first marathon. Last week had a bit of a monkey wrench tossed in because of pain I started to experience in my IT band. I (almost) immediately switched to cross-training and extra stretching and will continue that this week. After an easy 3 miles on the treadmill today I am convinced that with another week of running rest, I should be good to go on March 1st.
My plan for the rest of this week is to put in three more days of cardio on the bike, a Pilates session, and two days of stretching and rest. I will drink a lot of water and do everything in my power to eat healthy, well balanced meals. I will need to do some research tomorrow to see what exactly those meals should consist of, but I’m pretty sure the pre-race diet doesn’t include pizza, nachos, cookies, and ice cream. Good thing I got those out of my system this weekend! Continue reading
At the end of a long run, the legs are inevitably tired which is to be expected. I understand the important role that the knees play in running and that they certainly carry a lot of the body’s weight and movement. Doing core exercises and strengthening and stretching the pelvis, hips, and legs will help the knees and legs remain strong during a run. Without a strong core to keep the body in a nice straight line while running, your knees will bear the brunt of any sideways movement of the body and you’ll feel the pain later.
Last summer a girlfriend and I realized we were both in a work-out slump. We wanted to be exercising regularly and we knew the exercises we wanted to do (mostly running, Pilates, Yoga, and a few weight routines) and we both categorized ourselves as morning exercisers. However, we were severely lacking the motivation to actually get up and work-out. Somewhere a light bulb went off and we decided to put our cell phones’ unlimited text plans to use and thus began our version of The Buddy System.
For the last few weeks I have been dabbling lightly with the best pre-run routine for long Sunday runs. I’m acutely aware of the need to fuel up before heading out but I’ve also become more in tune with the amount of time it takes for my body to wake up and go through its own routines.
I recently wrote about the 
I am a fairly patient and tolerable person; it takes a lot to get me riled up and I tend to like most things. There are only a couple things I truly hate: mosquitoes and being cold. I would take being hot over being cold any day. When I’m cold I feel like I can’t function, I usually scrunch my shoulders up to my ears which ends up hurting, and I’m liable to lose my usually positive spirit if I’m freezing. For these reasons, I avoided 
When I first decided I wanted to run a marathon in 2009 I set my sights on the ING NYC Marathon in November. I still have my heart set on doing that run, but I also thought it might be wise to run one sooner so that I would know what training was all about and to make sure I could do it. I knew the B&A Marathon was March 1st and because it’s local, that seemed like a good choice.
Tomorrow I have a flight at the crack of dawn down to Miami for a boat show. In 
Pura vida, pure life in Spanish, is a mindset, a way of living, a goal, an experience, something to create, something to share. Pura vida came to life for me and my husband on our honeymoon in Costa Rica where we first heard the phrase. Pura vida was a greeting, the answer to “how are you,” a toast, a beginning and an end to each day and we reveled in it. Costa Rica, all the