2016 New Year's Day 5k

after the race. it was still overcast and breezy.

Friday I ran our local New Year's Day 5k. It's the only local race in January and it's a good way to start the year.

I have slacked off on my running and have been struggling with food issues for several months, so my weight is back up (boo!) and my endurance is down. I went into this race not expecting anything, definitely not a PR, though each of the two times I've ran this race in the past I have PR'd. Last year it was my fastest 5k time for the whole year and in 2013 I ran the fastest 5k I've run since high school.

Friday I ran 3.09 miles in 33:01, which makes it my fastest 5k in the last 3 years. Three years ago was the 2013 version of this race, which I ran in 29:36. Overall, this is the third fastest 5k since we moved here 6 years ago. The 2011 Halloween 5k is my second fastest 5k at 32:03.

1st mile - 9:58
2nd mile - 10:43
3rd mile - 11:34

I wasn't sure how I'd do since I walked a lot of miles last week, completing the Army Virtual Marathon, which left my legs fatigued. I didn't run many of the miles since I didn't want to risk injury. In the end, I didn't feel the fatigue as much as I feared I would. I could tell that I still need to work on my running endurance and I still haven't done enough hill work. Despite that, I was able to run most of the race and only walked about .25 miles.

 It was cold (mid-40's) and a bit windy, but I didn't notice the wind while running, so it must have been a cross-breeze and not too strong. Overall, the running conditions were pretty good.

With the slow-down of races in January I can focus more on training and preparing for races. There's at least 5 weeks before my next race, but I'm still not sure of my race schedule in February (Mr M's drill schedule is still up in the air as he transfers units), so I'm not sure which of the three races I'd like to do will actually happen. The over-achiever in me wants to do all of the, but we'll see what the reality is.

1st race of 2016:

Month	Event	Time
January	New Year’s Day 5k	33:01

11th race toward 40 by 40:

	Date	Event	Distance	Event Type
1.	July	4th of July 5k	5k	Pregnant
2.	August	4 Mile Fun Run	4 miles	Road Race
3.	September	All Terrain	5k	Mixed surface
4.	October	Hill Valley Half	13.1 miles	Virtual half marathon
5.	October	Corn Maze 5k	5k	Corn Maze
6.	October	Kilted Trail 5k	5k	Kilted race
7.	November	Trail Half	13.6 miles	Trail Half
8.	November	Turkey Trot	5k	Road Race
9.	December	Veteran’s 5k	5k	Mixed surface
10.	December	Army Virtual Marathon	26.23 miles	Virtual marathon
11.	January	New Year’s Day 5k	5k	Road race

Army Virtual Marathon Recap

Wednesday I finished my 16th race this year (my highest total in one year!) and the 10th towards my 40 by 40 goal (one quarter of the way finished!).

I completed 26.23 miles in 8:56:25. I did it in 6 legs and walked most of it, only running about 2.5 miles. I'd like to have run more, but squeezing in so many miles into such a short amount of time (the majority of the mileage was done in 4 legs spread over 5 days) was hard enough on my body and I didn't want to risk shin splints or other injuries. I also didn't want to get too fatigued and not have any energy left for the New Year's Day 5k.

Since I finished my race mileage on Wednesday I was able to rest on Thursday and run the 5k on Friday.

I've run one full marathon and completed it in 5:54:34, so obviously this was not my fastest marathon, but I didn't expect it to be. Since I walked so much of it I really didn't have any time expectations, though I am glad I squeezed in under 9 hours :)

I'm still torn about how to classify these virtual races. While the distance is a half or full marathon, when I tally up my races, I'm not counting them in the half and full marathons I've run since I didn't run these in one day. If I had, I would count them as such, but my schedule and training just can't handle it.

I do like the flexibility of the virtual races and the ability to complete them over several days, or even weeks. I'm planning on a virtual 5k in March (pi for the win!), but I think that will be my last virtual race for my 40 by 40 goal.

2015 Races:

Month	Race Time
Army Virtual Marathon	8:56:25
December 5k	34:16
Turkey Trot (November)	33:30
Trail Half (November)	3:35:17	Actually 13.61 miles
Kilted Trail 5k (October)	38:12
Corn Maze 5k (October)	37:42	Ran without stopping
Hill Valley Virtual Half Marathon (October)	3:43:00
September 5k	37:36	Almost 10 weeks postpartum
August 4 mile	1:00:18	almost 6 weeks postpartum
July 5k	47:44	38 weeks pregnant
June 5k	41:19	34 weeks pregnant
May 5k	40:05	29 weeks pregnant pushed River in the jogger
April 5k	42:36	28 weeks pregnant pushed River in the jogger
March 5k	35:32	22 weeks pregnant
February 5k	33:55	20 weeks pregnant
January 5k	33:25	12 weeks pregnant

40 by 40 Races:

	Date	Event	Distance	Event Type
1.	July	4th of July 5k	5k	Pregnant
2.	August	4 Mile Fun Run	4 miles	Road Race
3.	September	All Terrain	5k	Mixed surface
4.	October	Hill Valley Half	13.1 miles	Virtual half marathon
5.	October	Corn Maze 5k	5k	Corn Maze
6.	October	Kilted Trail 5k	5k	Kilted race
7.	November	Trail Half	13.6 miles	Trail Half
8.	November	Turkey Trot	5k	Road Race
9.	December	Veteran’s 5k	5k	Mixed surface
10.	December	Army Virtual Marathon	26.23 miles	Virtual marathon

Sunday Funny

River enjoying the Fisher Price nativity set

 These pictures are funny for multiple reasons.

1. I never let my kiddos run around in just their diapers, yet here River is, just in his diaper (I wish I could remember why).
2. Mr M was a climber at this age as well. He pulled out the drawers of a tall dresser and used them as steps to get to the telephone that he wanted that was on top of the dresser. River just had to climb from the chair seat to the chair arm to get on the cabinet.
3. In the picture below River is kissing the little dog that goes with the nativity. He loves dogs and kisses them whenever he can. Real, fake, it doesn't matter to him....

Christmas PJ Pics

can you tell that River is losing it?

This should have been posted closer to Christmas, but I forgot.

We miscalculated our timing a bit on Christmas and didn't end up with great Christmas pj pictures. The one above is pretty representative of most of the shots we got. River really didn't want to sit still for a picture. Ocean didn't care. Sunshine made an effort to smile, but we still ended up with quite a few where she just looked bored.

We did manage to get a shot of River smiling by himself and a pretty good shot of Sunshine and Ocean together.

But the next two were as good as we could get. 

River has a piece of candy in his cheek that we tried to bribe him with and Ocean doesn't look like he's enjoying being manhandled by River. At least Sunshine was smiling.

Slightly out of focus, forced smiles, and looking in different directions. Yep, that's about right :) 

Hope  everyone had a good Christmas!