Running and Then Quilting About It

Sometimes, no matter how important a goal is, no matter how badly I want to improve my times, I just can't get myself to run.  This was one of those weeks.  And I'm not talking about a week where I didn't really feel like running and so I made up a bunch of excuses or was too lazy to even put on my running shoes.  I mean one of those weeks where I felt like the world was out to get me and nobody wanted to be around me because I couldn't stop complaining about everything that was happening (or not happening).  By the end of the week, having only done 4 miles, I knew I either had to get a couple of really long runs in, if I wanted to reach my goal of 30 miles per week, or scrap the entire week and start again next week.  I kept telling myself that I would get the long runs, but when I realized that I was starting to struggle to even get out of bed, I re-evaluated the decision and chose the week-scrapping option.

I know that when you're starting to feel depressed, exercise is supposed to help.  Something about endorphins?  I haven't gotten to that part of medical school yet (I'm not really in med school).  But what if you're feeling too sloth-like to exercise?  The answer is, you should sew a quilt out of your old running shirts.  Like this:

I count sewing a quilt of running shirts (and other random shirts) as a running-related activity.  So basically it was like exercise.  It turns out I don't actually know how to make an entire quilt, so I just made the front piece, minus the outer-border, because to do that you really only need to know how to cut things and how to sew in a straight line.  And how to spend three hours seam-ripping the t-shirts out of a quilt I started four years ago that I thought was ugly.  This one I like, as long as I don't stare at it too long because then I get dizzy.  Now all I have to do is wait six months for my aunt to come visit and teach me how to make the quilty-part of the quilt!

What I'm really getting at here, is the reason why I hate that most races hand out tech-shirts now.  How am I supposed to save those for ten years and then sew them into a quilt?  I don't know how to sew with that material, and I think if I used iron-on backing (like I did for my cotton t-shirts in this quilt), everything would melt.  Am I just supposed to wear these shirts and then never have them be a part of a quilt?  That doesn't even make a little bit of sense.

Has anyone else had success making a t-shirt quilt (or part of one) with your old running shirts?  Or found something more interesting/crafty to do with them?  I especially need help here with the tech t-shirts, it's rare that I get a tech t-shirt from a race that actually fits well enough to wear, so I need an alternate use for them... fancy scrunchies?  Compression sleeves?  Let me know if you've come up with anything!

Miles run in 2012: 103
Average miles/week in 2012: 20.6

Vintage Kathy Griffin

Great news!  I once again accomplished a week of 30 miles!  That makes two out of four weeks so far this year.  Not too bad, but since my goal is to average 30 miles, I still have a lot of work to put in before I can consider myself on track.

What I learned this week, is that while I may be in shape to run 30 miles a week, I'm not really in shape to do 26 miles in three days.  As of Thursday this week, I had only done 4 miles, so 26 miles is what I was facing through Saturday.  I did a hard 7 on Thursday, and then 13 on Leif Erickson on Friday.  I set off for this long run at around 2:30PM, and was extremely proud of myself for remembering to bring water and a GU pack for the run.  So prepared!  Except I wasn't, because I only ate a little cereal, a bite of mashed potatoes, and a few jelly beans, during that day, before my long run.  My 100 calorie GU pack helped a little, but at mile 11 I felt completely depleted.  Oops.  At least I remembered to take Pascal with me also.  Here's a picture of him at mile 5.

The most exciting part of this run was that I noticed that the 5 1/4 and the 5 1/2 mile posts had been repainted and now show the correct mileage.  They used to be switched.  They probably fixed this a while ago, but it's been a long time sine I ran more than ten miles on Leif.

When I got home, I opened up my new Runner's World magazine, and saw this ad:

I might be wrong, but I think this ad is stupid.  What I understand, is that Lululemon is trying to show you that they sell running clothes.  But they don't show any of their running gear in the picture.  I also know for a fact that they sell yoga clothes, but here they're pretending they don't even know what yoga is.  Why would I want to go to a store that doesn't even know what yoga is, when they primarily sell things to use while you do yoga?  I know that's an overly literal way to look at the ad, but I still think it's dumb.  I would hope that they would take one of their hundred dollar bills they get every single time they sell a single pair of pants, and use it to hire someone better at marketing.

By Saturday morning I had finally calmed down about how stupid that ad is, and tried to mentally prepare myself for the remaining 6 miles of my 30 mile week.  I went to the Nike Campus with my running buddy, and as soon as I started running, I knew it was going to be difficult.  And it was - I had to walk for a minute or two every mile, but I made it!

I found this silly creature near a pond on campus, and he helped me have a lot more fun when I ran.  I tried to call it a beaver, but then was told that it's definitely not a beaver.  I tried to look up what kind of animals are on the Nike campus, and just got a bunch of results for animal rights protests against Nike.  Does anyone know what this is?  Besides super cute?

When I got tired of running around the trails, I went over to run on the track.  Their track is a good happy-medium between track and trail, since it has a bunch of trees in the middle.  I didn't find any cute creatures here though, unless you count the guy power-washing the track.

Miles run in 2012: 99
Average miles/week in 2012: 24.75

Level Green!

After going on a run today, I came home and checked my Nike+ account, and Paul Rodriguez popped up on the screen and told me that I had graduated from level orange to level green!  This is great news - it means that I have officially run over 155 miles while carrying my iPhone.  This is a pretty big deal, because I've never been a fan of carrying things while I run, but now I know that I can achieve the goal of running-while-holding-things if the thing is something that tracks my miles and turns running into statistics.

The run that pushed me from orange to green was down and back up Terwilliger, from A-Boy, and added 7 miles to my week.  I'm not doing the best job of making it to 30 miles a week, but if I can somehow manage to get 19 more in the next two days, I'll be back on track!

The only other miles I've done this week are from a track meet, Tuesday Night at the Races.  I blogged all about that on the Run Oregon blog, so if you want to know about that then you should read it there.

If you're only still reading my blog because you want to see more of my puppy, here's a video of him this morning when he was super-hungry for breakfast:

Miles run in 2012: 80
Average miles/week in 2012: 23

Winner of the 2012 Mile Time Prediction

I'm embarrassed to admit to you, my readers, that lately I have had things in my life that have taken priority over blogging.  Please accept my promise to you that this will never happen again, or more realistically, that if it does, I will be extremely humiliated.  I know you've been really angry at me for telling you that I would run a mile and then give a prize to whoever came close to guessing my time, and then not saying another word on the subject.  Your anger can end now.

I actually ran my timed mile almost two weeks ago, on Tuesday the 10th.  Differences between last year's mile and this year's mile were:

1. Last year was at Cleveland High School, this year at Grant High School
2. Last year I had a photographer, this year I did not
3. Last year I ran alone, this year I had someone to pace me
4. Last year I got 14 people to guess at my mile time, this year I only got 5

I think that number 4 is the most important difference seen here, as it confirms my suspicion that very few people care how fast I can run a mile, and my failure to quickly produce a prize for last year's winner has made even less people care.  I will be sure to get prizes out to both winners promptly (although not just yet), and maybe next year I can get a record-breaking number of people to guess (that would only take 15 people!).

 Number 3 is the second most important, because having a pacer can really help in improving your mile time.  I still went out too fast (81 seconds, which is 5:24 pace), but it really helped when at the end I got all lazy and had someone there to remind me how much faster I can actually run.

I can tell you're getting super curious about my time by now, and I assure you that I'm about to tell you.  But first, here's what people guessed:

5:42       5:50       6:00       6:02       6:03

While I appreciate the 5:42 and the 5:50, the sad news is that I'm not that fast yet.  I thought for sure that the 6:02 would have no chance, since the times right around it got guessed, but it turns out that I was exactly 6:02 fast at the mile, making my good friend Chris McDonald the Ultimate Grand Supreme Winner of this competition.  Congratulations Chris McDonald!  Your prize will come soon(ish).

 Chris the Winner is the one without an X on his face.  I don't know who the X people are but this is a nice picture of Chris so I stole it from facebook anyway.  At least it was nice until I put red Xs on it.  I'm sure photo credits should be given to some very fancy photographer, but I don't know who.

The best part about only five people guessing, is that it makes it really easy for me to create statistics about the readers who care about my running time.  Blogger gives me some statistics about who reads my blog, but it's all very vague and impersonal.  But now I can tell you things like this:

• 100% of my readers are male between the ages of 25 and 29
• 40% of my readers live outside the United States
• 20% of my readers are really good at making cat-shaped lamps
• 40% of my readers have a twin

 If you're super sad about missing out on the chance to win a cool prize and being part of my readership statistics, don't worry, I might do this again next year.  In the mean time, I'll be taking another couple of stabs at the mile in the next few weeks at University of Portland's Tuesday Night at the Races, which are indoor track meets.  I won't be giving out prizes for correctly guessed times, but I will accept encouraging words of encouragement.  I really want to beat 6 minutes!


On a final note, yes, I am still working on my goal of averaging 30 miles per week.  I've only made it to 30 miles one out of the three weeks of 2012 so far, but that's the beauty of allowing averaging.  I can still accomplish my resolution, I just have to run more than 30 miles during some weeks now - which isn't easy, but it is possible.


Puppy of the week: Blaze, my cousin's dog, who I visited in San Jose this weekend.  8 months old and almost 100 pounds!  We went running up Bear Mountain while I was there.

Miles run in 2012: 69
Average miles/week in 2012: 23

Blogging In the New Year

Happy 2012, boys and girls!  I know you must be be on the edge of your seats in anticipation of learning my latest mile time, but I have bad news: I didn't do it.  Almost immediately after declaring that I would soon be doing my mile test, I got a terrible winter cold and recovered from it just in time for the holidays, and to study for a big terrible test I have to take (not the running kind).  And so sadly, the mile test is going to be put off for at least, but hopefully not much longer than, another week.  But I promise it will get done, since I know it's so important to so many people.

On a happier note, I am pleased to announce that my personal blogosphere is growing!  Earlier in December, I met with Kelly Barten, who runs the Run Oregon blog on OregonLive.com.  She invited me to be one of their community bloggers, and I have since contributed one race preview entry, with a race recap to be published later today!  Kelly started the Run Oregon blog about five years ago (if I'm remembering correctly), as a way to promote running in the community and create a a place for people to share information about events.  It was great meeting someone who has the same goals as I do, and has found a much more effective and much less narcissistic way to accomplish them.

Speaking of goals, it's resolution time!  In 2010, my resolution was to run 25 miles a week, every week.  I was really successful at this until around May, and then after my first marathon in June I became injured, and ran almost not at all.  Last year I resolved to run five times a week.  I barely kept track of this, and certainly didn't do it.  This was a bad resolution, because if I hadn't gone on a run by Wednesday, I had already failed.  Aiming for a certain week mileage was better, because it forced me to go on my long runs at the end of the week if I hadn't taken care of my mileage earlier.  My shortcoming here was that I never stretched or did any cross-training, and so injury was inevitable.

This year, my resolution is to average 30 miles a week, and to do it without getting hurt.  This will be a very challenging goal to meet, but I'm going to give it my best shot.  I tried out 30 miles a week for the two weeks in December before I got sick, and I felt really good, and achieved a PR (for the last 8 years) in the middle of these two weeks.  I'm also 25 going on 26, so it's time to step up my game as I enter my prime long-distance running years.

I would like to give a year-end report on my mileage for 2011, but sadly my records were terrible, despite my intent to keep a detailed running log.  I moved a bunch this year, and somehow lost my running log, so that was useless.  I did give myself hints of how much I ran throughout the year however, the last three months being the most helpful, as I was using Nike+.  So I'm going to estimate that I ran 500 miles in 2011.  Slightly less than my 536 in 2010, a bunch more than I ran in 2009 with 307 miles, and way less than the 1500+ miles I'll have to run to accomplish my 30 miles a week resolution this year.  Like I said, a lofty goal, but I'm going to try it.

Did anyone else come up with running-related resolutions?  Or interesting resolutions of any kind?

Pascal resolved to be cute forever.  So far, he's very good at it.

Miles run this week: 3.5
Miles run in 2012: 3.5
Average miles/week in 2012: 3.5