Rant Over ABC Article

There is a ton of garbage on the interent. We all know this. But there are times when this garbage gets to me, well tonight has to be one of those nights. I am mad because I have lost a lot of weight, 120 pounds and I did it for all the right reasons.

Well according to Liz Kreutz, on the abc news blog on relationships you should "Beware Your Partner's Sudden Interest in Fitness"

 This is found under the "advice" section of their blog. How can this be advice?

I found my partner reading this today and it is probably what pissed me off the most. Losing weight is such a journey, such a life changing one. And fitness? I have come to absolutely love fitness and running. In fact Liz I am running my first full marathon next weekend after being obese for my entire adult life. I do not appreciate the fact that my journey has been belittled in this article, that my partner was reading it and actually let it feed into his own insecurities about my journey for a few minutes.

The fact is we have been together for 8 years. He knew me as obese insecure Colleen, he fell in love with that version of me. And then together we had out beautiful daughter. I was not happy for a long time, I lived on 7 medications a day one of them being  an anti depressant. It was not happy times for me, I was a mess. Having my daughter made me realize I had to start living.

I started to take an interest in losing weight and FITNESS. I started losing weight, I started getting healthy, I was able to come off my medications. I started to feel something I had not felt in years, confidence. I felt alive for the first time in a long time, and after that first 5K I ran in September of 2010 I had a new love of running.

But one love that has not changed, this entire time is the love I have for my partner. I loved him when we looked like this:

And he loves me still even though I look like this:

But here is the most important thing, even though I have changed on the outside, on the inside I am still the same woman with the same heart. And I love him still.

So please beware when giving advice, it is not always accurate. And to everyone else, please realize that some things on the internet are just garbage and you cannot really take it all to heart, if your partner has taken an interest in fitness, I encourage you to embrace it and share in their interest. Who knows it might be more fun to go running together than you think :)

Marathon Training Week 20

20 weeks has flown by!! I cannot believe that my marathon is 10 days away!! I remember signing up for this and thinking its far away I have plenty of time to prepare. Well now the day is almost here and I feel like I could use a little more time, BUT I am sure it is like anything we always want more time ;)

Monday- I did not do much since I was recovering from that 29 mile run on Sunday. I did manage a crossfit workout at home after work, and felt good when I was done.

Tuesday- I have decided Tuesday is snail day. Every time I run on Tuesday it seems to go slow and a bit painfully. I am blaming Marathon training ;) I managed 4.25  miles in 45 minutes!!! I told you it was snail paced lol

Wednesday- This run was much better! I did 5.5 miles in 50 minutes. It was a nice cool crisp early morning run, those are my favorite kind ;)

Thursday- I only had time for a quick run today and that is what I did. I ran 4 miles in 32 minutes! Super fast pace for me but it felt good.

Friday I took a rest day because my legs are getting tired and the marathon is coming soon ;)

Saturday- I went to meet Nicole for her first ever 5 mile run!!! She is training to do the 8K in Philly and this was her longest run to date. I was very proud of her and I was with her every step of the way. She did great and she is going to kill Philly!!! It is so much fun getting newer runners motivated to push further and workout with them! A great part of Fitmas :)

(Cmon Nicole I cant have Damian being the only one with pics in is bright shirts ;)

Sunday- My epic hilly test, aka half-marathon!!! You can read about it here. :) Yes I am carrying around a shiny new badass hilly PR of 1:46 Yes I felt like superwoman that day ;)

What else exciting happened this week?

Oh yes I got my bib number for Philly!!!!!!!!!!!!!! I am 3601 and in the 4th corral!!! This sounds speedy to me so I am a little freaked out by it but we will see how it goes ;) The corral color is green, which was Grandma's favorite color, so I felt a tiny sign from her that it will all be ok.


How was your week?

Manchester Half Marathon Recap

I signed up for this race on a whim. My marathon training called for 14 miles today and honestly I was so tired of doing long runs solo that I wanted some company ;) What a better way than to sign up for a race and recruit as many people as possible??!? Well in came the Manchester Half Marathon.

I recruited Damian of course, he is as addicted as I am to half marathons. Then Gene hopped on the bandwagon and Heather too! There were also a few other Daily Mile peeps there as well! It was fun to meet them all finally.

Manchester is pretty far from me so I set out at 5:30am to make the hike out there. It was cold, 20 degrees outside... I got there at 7am and waited to meet Damian. He was going to start early at 7:50 and had picked up my number for me from the day before. I went to the start line to see him off and then headed to the flag pole to meet the daily mile people.

I really liked how they let runners start this race early. The race was set to start at 8:50 but you could start early if you wanted to take your time and not worry about the cut off as much. It was nice for us all to be able to finish around the same time and celebrate together.

I waited freezing patiently for the race to begin. I was nervous. You know when you run half marathons all year long it does get addicting but it also puts a little pressure on you. I know I had to finish in under 2 hours (to be happy for myself), I know I would be facing my toughest one yet as well. I wanted to relax and take it easy but I also have a marathon to be ready for in 2 weeks so I had to push my speed to train for that.

The hills in this race were endless. Literally, every single time you thought there was a break, another would pop out. You can see the elevation chart from my Garmin report. It was insane. I ran that first mile pretty fast there were no big hills. Then once you got in about 1.3 miles it began. It was not bad at first but by mile 4 I was starting to feel it. I tried to keep up my pace but fell into the high 8s on a few occassions. I did not let it bother me. I took advantage of the no hills spots in the race and pushed for a sub 8 pace then.

My favorite part of this race? There was a half mile in the woods on some trails and I loved it. Every single time I get to run on a trail I love it. This only reinforces my need to find a trail running group and start training for other kinds of races ;)

I found Damian at mile 9 and he started talking smack! He was like oh did you fall I thought you would have met me at mile 8... I was a little annoyed LOL those hills were a bitch I reminded him and I was planning to kick it up now all the way to the to the finish line! I took my last gel and drank some nuun and said bye to Damian and sped off.

At mile 10 I looked at my Garmin and saw my time, I knew if I pushed it up just a tiny bit I might hit a new PR! I started really pushing and took my last walk break. Yes I stuck with the Galloway method this entire race, taking my 30 second walk break at every mile marker, no it did not seem to slow me down. My legs felt great and after a walk break I had a refreshed feeling. Then I hit mile 11.5 and my shoe came untied! I started to panic, I pondered stopping to tie it or keep going. The competitor in me spoke louder and I kept booking it to the finish line. I felt likt my shoe would fly off but it did not ;) The last mile of this race was all down hill, it was great! I was flying, literally I had a 6:36 pace that I held steady for the entire 12th mile going into 13. I felt great, at that moment after all those taxing hills to still be able to pull out that 6:36, I was almost in tears.

I crossed the finish line and ran to my car to keep cooling down. I got on my sandals and grabbed some protein and headed back to cheer in my friends. I saw Heather come in and then Gene! They both did great. Then I saw Damian, he had a tougher time today but I was proud of him. The days leading up to this race he began brewing with self doubt and even thought he would not finish. But he did finish and did great!

 Gene had a nice hat.....





The race was good. I liked how organized it was, there was plenty of free parking and my big need porta potties! They were lined up all around the common area where the race was. I also liked how they had healthy options after we finished, I dined on a banana, some raisins and there was other not bad options for gluten folks like hot soup and granola bars. Also good about this one? Support. There were enthusiastic crowds around all the mile markers and in the neighborhoods, and everyone was smiling and happy.

The official race results are here!

I was the 37th female to finish and 13th in my age group 20-29!! I finished 195th over all with a new PR of 1:46:12!!!!!!!!!!!!!! This was amazing to me. The more I think about it the more I smile.  There is nothing like earning a new PR on a day when you intended to just go and have fun :)

I brought home my medal and someone stole it ;) She likes the "runners and castle" on the front. I guess I cannot argue with her it is a nice new piece of bling to add to our collection!