Miles to go...

If these shoes could talk...

So close...

So I am here riding out Hurricane Sandy with the rest of the northeast and realizing that this weather event is coming between me and a goal. I am a little over two measly miles from having run 1,000 miles in my "running lifetime."

Sure that's not much to people who have trained for marathons and regularly run ultras, but for someone who never intended to be serious about running, it is a huge milestone for me. I also had hoped to complete enough miles to finish 400 by the end of this month and 500 by the end of this year. I'm 14 miles away for October and I'm losing.

Suddenly, I don't feel so good about scoffing at the runners who braved the wind and the rain earlier today to get in their mileage. I'll probably be able to grab the two miles on Wednesday for the 1,000, but looks like I'm going to taste defeat for the 400.

The sleep I've lost..

But sometimes you have to sacrifice the great for the good. I've still got two months left of running in this year and even a couple of races to close out the year. I have a greatest hits list of things to be grateful to running for and here is just a few:

The road rash..

1. Mostly injury free for nearly two years
2. All the wonderful friends its brought to my life
3. The beautiful places my feet have taken me
4. My physical, mental and emotional health
5. A greater connection with the world around me

What has running done for you? Let me know what you're grateful to running for.

Run on,

-- The Brown-Runner Chick

Out Running Anemia: When you just can't...

Me not feeling well. :-(

I'm a fairly healthy person. I rarely get sick or feel ill. But when I do get sick, or feel less than my best, watch out. I go down really hard. I was tired during my Jacksonville trip, but I just chalked it up to my occasional bouts of insomnia.

But by Aug. 28, I felt so drained that not only had I not been able to run, I was often light-headed and having a hard time concentrating at work. I knew something was very wrong. My running-buddy Jenn and I had concluded that it was likely anemia, but you don't want to go taking iron supplements all willy-nilly so I took myself to the good people at Simplicity Urgent Care in Arlington, Va. to see what they could tell me.

Iron pills suck!

Jenn and I might look like ordinary runners, but we play doctors on TV. Our diagnosis was right -- boy were we right. The doctor basically said, "Take two steaks and these iron pills three times a day and call me in the morning." He also said something else I wasn't expecting: lay off the running!

Competitor Mag Article

I've battled anemia before, but never as a runner. I had no idea that distance runners, particularly female runners are at great risk of iron deficiencies. It makes sense, I just never put the two together. I also had been fiddling with vegetarianism and clearly not eating enough iron rich foods to replace the iron that you get from eating a nice piece of red meat.

But as a runner you know what I did: I ate the steak, kind of took the pills and basically laid off the running for two weeks and then got back out there. I feel a lot better now, but here are a few lessons learned:

1. Listen to your body. If you feel bad, or something is unusually painful, go to the doctor.
2. Cold turkey can be dangerous. No, eating cold turkey isn't dangerous, but drastically changing your diet without a plan for how to replace missing nutrients is.
3. Heal now, run later. Whether illness or injury, sometimes you simply have to stop what you're doing to speed your healing.

Until next time...happy running!

-- The Brown-Runner Chick

My consistent inconsistencies

Have you ever been super hype to do something and then halfway through it you realize you're already out of gas? That appears to be what has happened with this blog. :-/ My last post was in August! I had every intention of posting, but my travel schedule truly got the best of me.

As the title of this post points out, I am consistent in my inconsistencies. My bad y'all, but life has really been happening so let's see if we can get caught up, shall we?

A travel-running re-cap:

Main St. Bridge

Jacksonville, Fla.: During my business trip I had every intention of running with the ladies of BGR! here, but nearly every evening of that trip there was either severe lightening storms or I was driving back from Valdosta, Ga., Tallahassee or Cape Canaveral! Needless to say I was exhausted and could barely muster the energy to do the work that I was down there to do let alone run and blog. (I was additionally exhausted for another reason, but that's for another post). SCORE: Travel 1, Run Zip

Negril, Jamaica

Negril, Jamaica: I sooo needed this vacation, to just decompress and to tune back in to me. Though I had high hopes of trying to check in with local runners to get some insight into the Reggae Half Marathon, I just never got around to doing the necessary legwork. I did get in two mornings of beautiful, runs on the beach, one of which was my traditional birthday run. I typically run a minute for every year of life. So this year was 33 minutes. I highly recommend Negril in September. The beaches and resorts were far from crowded as I'm sure they are during peak seasons, and though people are hustling hard to sell you trinkets, jet ski rides, and yes, marijuana, you mostly have the place to yourself. I also highly recommend the Negril Treehouse Resort. It's not a fancy resort, but it was perfect. SCORE: Travel 1, Run 2

Good times, great friends!

Atlanta, Ga.: After taking a shuttle, two planes, a bus, the MARC train and then the WATA metro to Union Station, I got into a van filled with some of the great women of BGR! D.C. on one of the greatest road trips EVER! We laughed, we told the craziest stories and generally had a great time. The inaugural BGR! conference and race weekend appeared to go well. I bumped into friends from Georgia and Alabama, which really made my day. I also picked up some new friends which was great. I ran the 5K. Not my best time, but considering my running at the time was less than stellar, I'll take what I can get. All in all a great end to a busy birthday weekend. SCORE: Travel 1, Run 1.

Atlantic City Half Marathon: After all of that travel, I had nothing left to give, so I waved my white flag and bailed on this race. I don't recommend spending money on races you're not going to run, but sometimes you have to grab yourself by the collar and say, "Enough already. Give it a rest." SCORE: Travel Zip, Run Zip

So all-in=all, it looks like I broke even.

Stay tuned...

-- The Brown-Runner Chick