When Your Garmin Dies...

With all my fridge and foot drama I forgot to tell you guys that it's RACE WEEK!!!

Yup! Half Marathon #21 will be on Sunday in Miami Beach. This will be my second year doing the Miami Beach half (I missed last year's event but I ran it in 2015) so I'm looking forward to running the course again. My 2015 finish time was: 2:29:40 and I was kind of hoping for a course PR this year but I'm not sure how my foot will hold up. I'm icing it and am prepared to take more frequent walk breaks etc if I need to. So I'll just have to wait and see how race day goes 🙏.

My foot is still bugging me so I only did a one mile run today but my Garmin crashed about half way through!

It's been stuck on this screen for the past two hours...

I entered my run on the Garmin website manually (since I know where the one mile point is in my complex) and estimated the pace. And I've spent the entire night trying to troubleshoot it... but no luck 😭. I'm going to leave it overnight and hope & pray that it magically starts working tomorrow because I do not want to buy a new watch right now 😞.

Tales from the Trails {Ragnar Trail Alafia Race Recap -- Part 2}

"...that misery loves company, and happiness is only real when it's shared..."

[If you haven't read Tales from the Trails Part 1 check it out and then come back and read the rest of the race recap here]

So my first leg (the green loop) was officially done. My "shower pill" shower consisted of scrubbing every reachable crevice with my Shower Pill athletic body wipes. And my first real meal (since breakfast the previous morning) was chicken with rice and black beans. The rest of my Friday afternoon (into the evening) was spent waiting for my phone to charge at the charging station. 

Ragnar Trail Tip #6: Bring a powerful portable charger. Even with the latest mobile devices and their claims of extended battery life, chances are you will need to recharge your phone a few times over the course of the Ragnar weekend. I brought a portable charger with me but it took about four hours to charge it at the charging station... 

Tales from the Trails {Ragnar Trail Alafia Race Recap-- Part 1}

"We believe that being a Ragnarian is about more than being a runner..."

I joined my Ragnar Alafia Trail team in much the same way that I joined my Ragnar Chicago team (back in June of this year): I saw a post on Facebook about a team looking for runners... I asked if they were competitive or not (since my pace is slower non-competitive teams work best for me)... the team captain assured me that it was a non-competitive team... I registered and paid. This time, however, I convinced my friend Mary to join as well.

The week leading up to the race was filled with your typical "pre-trail race prep". Mary and her husband have gone camping before so they had all the camping gear we thought we would need. So really I just had to make sure my running clothes and personal equipment etc were ready and suitable for trail races.

Did I mention I had never run a trail race before? Yeah... never. I did one practice run (on what I would soon learn was a "baby trail" compared to the trails for the race) in the week before Ragnar and that was the extent of my trail experience. I had also never gone camping before. In general, I'm not really an outdoorsy kind of girl. I'm more of a "I need a hot shower and an air conditioned insect-free area to sleep" kind of girl.

Anyway, since Mary and I were traveling from the same area we decided to embark on the 300+ mile journey together the day before race day. Once we got there we just followed the line of cars heading into the wilderness campsite...

An Open Letter To My Brands...

Dear Garmin,
I should totally be a brand ambassador for your fitness watches...

There are several reasons for this but the main one is cause I love them and I spend a considerable amount of time strategically planning for when I can get the latest model. Don't get me wrong, my love for your watches isn't a blind stalker-ish kind of love. It is conditional on performance. But so far you have never disappointed me (although you really need to work on tracking open water swimming on all your multi-sport devices). By-the-way, thanks so much for Garmin Connect. Whoever thought of that should get a raise (you're welcome Steve... I'm just kidding I don't really know anyone named Steve that works for Garmin). Anyway, no pressure about the brand ambassador thing. It's just a really good idea (if I do say so myself) and you seem to be a company that has a lot of really good ideas product & promotion-wise. Anointing me "brand ambassador extraordinaire" would just be an extension of that. But like I said, no pressure.

Sincerely,
Your loyal "runner and expert open water swimmer-to-be" customer
LeAnne

P.S (my contact information is: thisismyfaster@gmail.com, you know, should you need it)

The Best Kind of Support

One of the cool things about being a ZOOMA Race Ambassador this year is all of the amazing support that I've gotten. The running community (in general) tends to be pretty supportive, but this year it's been really nice to have an additional support system for training. As a blogger I've been a part of several blogging Facebook groups, and as a Race Ambassador I'm a part of the ZOOMA FB group as well. We do the usual stuff in the group: post pictures of races and runs, get feedback on and ask questions about different running related things, and encourage each other for upcoming events, like the ZOOMA Annapolis Half Marathon coming up in June!!!!

[You can check out the race site HERE]

I also get a 10% discount code on all race registrations and I get to share that with everyone!!!

{REGISTER HERE}

100 Runners

A few days ago I asked several runners one simple question: "Why Do You Run?" The question may have been simple but the answers I got were profound and insightful. You can read all about them HERE. 

Talking to other runners about what motivated them to start running, and what motivates them to continue running, led me to start a new Instagram campaign! The goal is simple: I want to ask 100 runners the same question that they will each answer in one sentence (or as close to one sentence as possible)...

The first question is the one that got everything started ("Why Do You Run?") and I've asked each person to send me a picture of their running shoes to post along with their response...

The Shoe Chronicles...

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I was supposed to start another "30 day challenge" this month and commit to doing a blog post every day. Well… four days into that plan I'm writing my first blog post for February, so I'm going to attempt the challenge next month. But until that starts I didn't want to put off some of the things that I've been wanting to blog about; like my running shoes...

(some have been demoted to "gym" shoes and "wear with my scrubs" shoes)

Sunrise Run; Easter; Lunch and a Movie

I could barely sleep last night because I was so eager to run this morning! I had the same anxiety I normally have the night before a race, but luckily I didn't wake up feeling exhausted. I had several goals I wanted to conquer this morning:
1. Focus on my mid-foot/forefoot strike; &
2. Run 5 miles

The beach was crowded this morning as several churches held their Easter Sunday Sunrise services...

My Saturday Runner's High Alternative...

I GOT NEW SHOES TODAY!!!!! 

(although it's not the same as a real Runner's High, it comes pretty darn close)

I went to the Runner's Depot store this morning determined to find a more suitable pair of shoes. I have been running in Brooks Adrenaline GTS models since I started running in 2013, but I think that I have out grown them. Initially I needed a lot of the stability and support that those shoes provide, but now that I am a more efficient trying to be a more efficient runner, I think I can transition out of those shoes and into something else. My love affair with running will hopefully last forever, but that doesn't restrict me to the same type of running shoes forever right?

It's Spring Cleaning Time!!!!

I don't actually wait until it's Spring to clear the clutter out of my life (I hate hoarding stuff). But Spring has already started and today seemed like the right day to do another "clean house" activity (which surprisingly enough doesn't mean I'll actually clean; I just throw stuff away).

It's also the period in which I clean up other aspects of my life (including my social media pages). I can't speak for everyone but over time I find that my feeds are filled with a lot of great stuff, but also negative garbage as well. I know occasionally people feel the need to vent on their digital soap boxes for all the world to hear (see/read). And we all have bad days so the occasional rant doesn't bother me (much). But I'm a little over the negative/ profanity filled/ disparaging posts. So it's time to clean up my feed...

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