"I Only Run in Purple." - Anisum's Road PRs in 2018



Are you guys ready for a long update?

Week 23 (9/18-9/24):

Monday: 3 mi @ EA
Wednesday: 3mi @ EB + Strides
Thursday: 3mi @ EA
Saturday: 4mi @ EB + Strides
Sunday: Ocean City 10 Miler (@LR pace)

This was my first full week on my new DopeyBadger Plan™.Overall this plan is to get me to Dopey and has me run at 5 days a week until mid-November before working up to 6 days a week. We'll see how it goes. Some notes from this week:

  • Monday I actually ran in the afternoon because it wasn't too hot out. That was a really nice change of pace for me.
  • Wednesday I got to try out strides for the first time and I think it went well
  • Thursday's run almost became a Friday run because it wasn't until late afternoon that I remember I run on Thursdays instead of Fridays now
  • Saturday I forgot to do strides until 3.6 miles so there were far less strides.
  • Sunday... ugh Sunday.
The rest of the week can be divided into three categories.

The Good:
Marathon Weekend Medals Came Out!!! Cue obligatory medal analysis.
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First up we have the 5k. The main reason I was when they switched 5k medals over from plastic was in anticipation of getting a Pluto medal. This medal does not disappoint. I love the brushed steel kind of look to the coloring that makes the design pop! I love the yellow which makes it stand out more. My only complaint is that it's not just Pluto. Don't get me wrong, Mickey is great but Pluto's my fave and he kind of deserves a medal to himself since it's the 25th anniversary of the 5k too.

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Next up, the 10k. Are those polka dots on the ribbon? You know they have to be. I like this but I will say I have a few more complaints about this one. My main concern is that the characters don't pop on this quite they do on the medals that have more of a brushed look. That combined with the fact that Minnie is wearing shorts made it tough for me to tell who was who until I happened upon the bow. Also, I know it's the anniversary for marathon weekend but it's also the 5th anniversary of the 10k and Minnie, like Pluto deserves that recognition.

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Next is the half. You can tell by the added color that things are starting to get serious. The brushed look is back on this medal and Mickey and Donald just pop. I want to note though that all the medals up to this point USE THE SAME IMAGE OF MICKEY. I know it's the big promotional runDisney image but guys, this is kind of lazy. Donald is sharing the spotlight with Mickey but really, his anniversary race was last year (or it was until it got rained out) so I think it's acceptable for Mickey to jump in here.

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Here's the one we've been waiting for. It's the marathon medal. It's got those wonderful Mickey ears. The big '25 Years' (don't you forget it) on both the medal and the ribbon and it's a spinner. It's in full color too. My only complaint is with the 'You Can Do It!' because if the other side doesn't say 'If You Can Dream It...' it will be weird and awkward getting a medal that says 'You Can Do It' for something I've already done.

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Bonus medals! The Goofy Challenge medal is a bit odd. It works perfectly if you only do the Goofy challenge. Two round medals with the oddly shaped challenge in the middle. Again, I prefer them brushed because the details pop and using the same Mickey on every medal is a lot but overall it's very nice. It will be odd being the only not round medal in my Dopey set though... not sure what to do about that. The Dopey medal is amazing! I love the gems! It's so perfect and look, it shows that it's the anniversary and doesn't have Mickey on it. The only thing I'm on the fence about is that while the turquoise gems are accurate to the movie since they didn't color Dopey, using green gems the color of Dopey's clothes would work better with the ribbon.

In not medal news... I got a heart rate monitor! It's the Scosche Rhythm+ and it was reccomened to me by @DopeyBadger and @garneska. I was able to use it Saturday and Sunday. So far it's pretty comfortable and it's very easy to link to my Garmin so I've very pleased. Of course it doesn't come in purple so I got lime green instead. There is one thing about it that bothers me...
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The Bad:
So I have my Garmin set up with the default heart rate zones which are determined by % of max. I'm not sure these are correct or if they are the best method because when I input my resting HR it seems much more in line with what I expect? Which method do you guys use.

I also had to transfer one of my 5ks to a new date. So, I will now be doing my final Run the Vineyards 5k on October 8th instead of the 15th. The good news is the race director was totally cool with my transferring which was wonderful. I just feel bad that I had to in the first place. Luckily both of those weekends I was scheduled to run 7 miles on Sunday, albeit in different formats so I should be good to just switch runs. Overall, this is more bad that became good but this section was lacking a bit otherwise.

The Ugly:
There is only one thing that could be called the ugly this week and that was yesterday's race. It was scheduled to be a nice 72F and Sunny with 75% humidity at the 8:30am start to the race. It was about 81F with 60% humidity at the finish. Guys, this race was the second worst race ever for me. The only race that was more painful was the 2016 Princess Half. As you are probably aware I hate the heat. I try and run in the mornings because the heat destroys me and while training in it may improve my overall fitness it's not the best for Disney because I'm generally acclimated for the cold by the time of year I go to race there. As such this was brutal for me. I actually got a personal worst on this race which suffice to say broke my streak of getting a PR every time I run a 10 miler (which isn't a terrible thing honestly).

The start, 8:30am. The one critique I have for the race is that they closed the bridge we would have to run over and back on (a bridge which was added during course modification after I signed up) at 8:00am. Knowing the weather in advance they could have sent out an email on Friday (when they sent 4 other emails about random race details) saying they were planning to start early. Since we wouldn't reach the bridge until mile 2.25 it should have been enough time to start the race at 8am. I'm sure there was some logistical reason they couldn't do it but it would have been nice. I was running to support L in her attempt to get a PoT for marathon weekend. I had planned to run it at LR pace. L would fall back for a bit and then surge and find me again (she does run/walk) but she didn't want me to slow my pace for her so I completed the first few miles between 12:00min/mi (my race pace for 10 miles) and 13:00min/mi in the hopes of finishing faster. The bridge, was a killer though. My Garmin was unable to get an elevation reading (since we were on an island and the bridge is over water) but the bridge itself has a clearance of 65' and is 178' long so if you want to do the math of that you're welcome to do so.

On the other side of the bridge was a water station. Did that water station have water? No. It was out which was tragic. Luckily they had Gatorade but that's not really my go-to on a run. I had brought my camelbak but I was trying to conserve that as well. We then had to go back over the bridge just after mile 4. By this point it was sunny and had surprisingly little breeze coming off of the ocean. A kind soul after mile 5 had their hose on and were offering to spray runners which was so kind and wonderful at that point.

The water station at mile 6ish had gels but I had brought one and because of the heat could not even bring myself to consume that but the thought was nice. They also had a pajama party going on and held signs saying 'my pajamas missed me'. At this point I missed them too. I could feel myself starting to slow.

Then came the boardwalk. Now whenever it's not raining the boardwalk is one of my favorite places to run. Usually you get an ocean breeze, there is always a ton to look at, and the boards provide a nice bounce that you can't get from asphalt. Today while the bounce was pleasant a miraculous lack of breeze and the loss of shade that trees in the garden district provided I was overheating. Most people spent more time walking than running. I managed to keep running but my pace was abysmal. I was in the 14:30 range at this point and my water supply was starting to dwindle. My fingers were swelling and it was bad news all around. Around mile 8.25 I had to walk to 8.5 which allowed L to catch up around 9. So I ended up run-walking the rest with her because I was toast.

My first time running a 10 miler I ran in 2:10:05 I think but this was 2:17:40 or so. Definitely a personal worst but it got L a PoT which is what really matters. It actually ended up corresponding pretty closely to the LR pace on the schedule which was a success. They gave us water, Gatorade, and an ice cold wash cloth at the finish as well as a bag to go put food in. The food was amazing. One of the other distance options was a half which may have contributed. There were homemade donuts (amazing!), cupcakes, scones, soft pretzels, water ice, the famous caramel corn in this area, and pizza. They didn't limit it you to one of each either, just so a brown paper lunch bag for the baked goods. I was able to take home a good amount of delicious donuts, two little bags of caramel corn, a soft pretzel, and ate a cupcake and pizza. That almost made up for the heat.

Plus when I got home I had a buffalo chicken cheesesteak from a great place that actually properly shreds their chicken for cheesesteak consistency.

Overall, despite the suffering and chafing of participants (lots of blood on the men's shirts if you know what I mean) I really liked the on course support from the community. It was fantastic with tons of signs, people cheering on the boardwalk and from their balconies, and police blocking traffic and waving cowbells in support. I would consider doing it again for the food and support if they offered day of (or even week before) registration. I'd be even more likely to run it again if they went back to skipping the bridge.

 
So I have my Garmin set up with the default heart rate zones which are determined by % of max. I'm not sure these are correct or if they are the best method because when I input my resting HR it seems much more in line with what I expect? Which method do you guys use.

I use %HRR which is an option on the Garmin Connect module. The zones are based on your restingHR and maxHR. If you don't know your maxHR, use the highest HR you see in a 5k. Until then you can use 220-age, but know that it's likely not accurate.

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Yay for medal analysis. I pretty much agree with everything you said. I'm dying for a reveal of the other side of that marathon spinner!! Has there been anything out there yet?

I'm sorry for such a tough race. The weather just got brutal again all of a sudden. Crazy that the water stop was out of water. That's just really poor race planning when it was so hot outside. Still congrats on finishing it in rough conditions!
 
I use %HRR which is an option on the Garmin Connect module.

I would like to second this. The 220-age method seemed to be the wrong zones for me. When I switched to this option the zones seemed to be more in line with how I felt.

I think you are too hard in yourself re the 10 miler. It sounded quite tough.

I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on those medals.
 
I love the medals because I prefer color, sparkle, and lots of mickey when it comes to bling. I also really like the gems on the dopey medal.

I can say that I 100% feel for you on your 10 miler. Misery loves company right? Buffalo chicken cheesesteak sounds amazing and you definitely earned it. That HR strap looks like something I'd prefer over chest straps for comfort. Gonna mark that down as one to look out for!
 
I love the medals because I prefer color, sparkle, and lots of mickey when it comes to bling. I also really like the gems on the dopey medal.

I can say that I 100% feel for you on your 10 miler. Misery loves company right? Buffalo chicken cheesesteak sounds amazing and you definitely earned it. That HR strap looks like something I'd prefer over chest straps for comfort. Gonna mark that down as one to look out for!
Oh yeah. It was a rough weekend for racing.
I use %HRR which is an option on the Garmin Connect module. The zones are based on your restingHR and maxHR. If you don't know your maxHR, use the highest HR you see in a 5k. Until then you can use 220-age, but know that it's likely not accurate.
That's what I thought it should be when I was looking at the HR. I'm not sure I have my max but I will be able to get that in a week or two and adjust it.
I would like to second this. The 220-age method seemed to be the wrong zones for me. When I switched to this option the zones seemed to be more in line with how I felt.

I think you are too hard in yourself re the 10 miler. It sounded quite tough.

I'm really looking forward to getting my hands on those medals.
Oh, I didn't go into it expecting to do well. I was just surprised at how difficult and how much of a wash it ended up being just because of the temperature difference and a bridge given my performance two weeks before. My complaints are more a stream of thought about how crappy I felt when I finished and how exhausted I was when I woke up this morning.

Glad to hear that you use the HRR method too. The 220-age seemed really off for me.

I can't wait for those medals.
Yay for medal analysis. I pretty much agree with everything you said. I'm dying for a reveal of the other side of that marathon spinner!! Has there been anything out there yet?

I'm sorry for such a tough race. The weather just got brutal again all of a sudden. Crazy that the water stop was out of water. That's just really poor race planning when it was so hot outside. Still congrats on finishing it in rough conditions!
Thanks! Finishing was my goal. I really was hoping we'd see the other side of the spinner courtsey of those at DL Paris this weekend but it seems that wasn't the case. :(
 
Week 24 (9/25-10/1):
MondayTuesday: 3 mi @ EA
WednesdayThursday: 3mi @ EB + Strides
Thursday: 3mi @ EA
Saturday: 4mi @ EB + Strides
Sunday: 5mi @ LR

So coming off of last Sunday's run I blatantly ignored by alarm when it tried to tell me to go running on Monday morning. It was a good choice because I was sore from the previous day. It went away not too long after I woke up so I'm sure I would have been fine running but sleeping felt good too. I resolved myself to run the next morning instead.

Tuesday: It was a pretty boring run overall, I encountered the cat food creepers driving way too fast around the neighborhood, stopping and feeding other people's outside cats but I didn't get close enough to see their license plate. I want to get their license plate because more than once I've had to reconsider crossing the street because I hear them barreling down the road before I even see their vehicle. I can't wait until it cools off so I can run in the afternoons. Also on Tuesday my company did a blood drive which meant no running on Wednesday since I had donated and officially missing one day of training this week. I could have made it up Friday but I didn't want to force it in.

Thursday: Went well as usual. It was actually cool out which was very nice. Encountered the cat food creepers and possibly saw their car pull into their driveway, that's something I want to keep my eye out for next time I run in the dark.

Saturday: Run went well. I remembered to do my strides which was something I forgot last Saturday.

Sunday: I didn't realize it but the town 5k was happening on Sunday. My main issue with the race is it happens to be a color run which is great for kids but not for my lungs. When I went out I got a half mile or so into my route before I saw the police barricades. A quick look online informed me the race would be starting in 15 minutes so I decided to continue along my route until the people at the front caught up to me. I got to about two miles in before I started to adjust my route. The race itself is two loops around town (really if they stuck in more side streets it could be done in a single loop but whatever) so I just avoided that half of town and ran back in the other side until I got to 4.5 miles and knew I could head home.

I did forget fueling despite my training plan telling me to fuel so that's my bad. I'll remember for next week.

Also, Wisconsin area runners. My friend in Madison is doing her first 5k this fall. I said I'd love to do a race with her in the spring. Any suggestions around 5k or 10k distance? She said they're about 2 hours from both Chicago and Milwaukee.
 
Nice job on your training week. I'm with you on color runs. We did one just one time with our kids and I remember thinking, "how can this be good for your lungs???"

Cat food creepers is bizzaro...
 
Great job thinking on the fly for your LR, as well as adjusting your schedule to get as much running is as made sense for your body this week!
 
Nice job on your training week. I'm with you on color runs. We did one just one time with our kids and I remember thinking, "how can this be good for your lungs???"

Cat food creepers is bizzaro...
Yeah, I did it once when I first started running and even then I wore a face mask. I will say I saw one where they used food coloring or maybe the same corn starch dye mixed with water in spray bottles and I liked that idea better.

The cat food creepers are pretty much the bane of my early morning runs. Like, at 5:30am it's creepy to park in front of someone's house with your emergency lights on, get out of the car, feed their cat, and drive away.
Great job thinking on the fly for your LR, as well as adjusting your schedule to get as much running is as made sense for your body this week!
Thanks!
 
Haven't checked in for awhile, but wanted to say great work on the 10-miler in those heated conditions!
Also, did a color run once last summer, and it was probably the most non-fun running experience I've had to date. I went into it thinking I wasn't going to like it (was peer pressured into it, of course), which wasn't a great attitude to have, I admit. If you saw me running when they were spraying the colors, you would have thought I was running through a toxic waste dump. It wasn't even timed, and I'm pretty sure the distance was short of a 5k based on my running app. Anywho, never again! Sorry to be so down on the color run! I know the kids love them!
 
Haven't checked in for awhile, but wanted to say great work on the 10-miler in those heated conditions!
Also, did a color run once last summer, and it was probably the most non-fun running experience I've had to date. I went into it thinking I wasn't going to like it (was peer pressured into it, of course), which wasn't a great attitude to have, I admit. If you saw me running when they were spraying the colors, you would have thought I was running through a toxic waste dump. It wasn't even timed, and I'm pretty sure the distance was short of a 5k based on my running app. Anywho, never again! Sorry to be so down on the color run! I know the kids love them!
I have a run with my goddaughter coming up and her aunt who also runs was like "Let's do a color run instead, it'll be more fun for the kids." and I was like "You can do a color run but I won't be anywhere near it." I despise color runs.
 
Week 25 (10/2-10/8):
Monday: 4 mi @ EA
Wednesday: 4mi @ EB + Strides
Thursday: 1mi @ WU + 2 mi @ Tempo + 1 mi @ CD
Saturday: 5mi @ EB + Strides
Sunday: 2mi @ WU + 5k + 2mi @ CU

Monday: I think I ran this in the afternoon/evening. My one mistake was not taking my headlamp because I thought it would be lighter for longer than it was. After this run I went for a walk around the block to cool off but that wasn't recorded.

Wednesday: Back to morning running because the brief almost fall like weather we had was gone. I remembered to do strides.

Thursday: I didn't run as early as usual because I didn't have to be in work as early. This was a mistake only because the route I planned on using had the street closed due to construction and while I run on the sidewalk it didn't seem the safest option so I improvised a random route.

Saturday: This run was nice. I played around with a different route. It started to get really hot around mile 4 but fortunately I got back inside before it got too bad.

Sunday: I got to packet pickup on the earlier end so I ran my 2 miles at WU pace then I met my aunt who was running the race and hung out while I ate my Cinnamon Apple Hammer Gel. I was between that and a Strawberry Huma gel because I wasn't certain I liked either but the Hammer Gel broke open in the corner so it was eat it or allow it to get everywhere. It was pretty good.

The race itself was a wonderful combination of road and vineyards in my opinion. It was slightly hilly but not too bad. Really the worst part was the 89% humidity which even with it being 75F and cloudy made for less than ideal conditions. The first half a mile was through the vineyard which was much wider than most vineyards and had fairly even ground. The path continued down the driveway of the winery and out to the road. At about 1.45mi we got off of the road and into another plot of vines. These were also planted with enough room to run and we were over there until mile 2.15 or so. Then back to the winery, another run through the vines and to the finish. My goal had been sub 36min/mi. I finished in 35:43 which was a PR for me.

I planned to run two miles after but I went out for a late breakfast instead and after Pumpkin Pie Stuffed French Toast and Banana Crumb Pancakes I didn't have it in me to go out and run so instead I took a shower and then went and napped for 3 hours.
 
I don't know what to congratulate you on more:
A) A PR after running a 2 mile WU
or
B) Pumpkin Pie Stuffed French Toast and Banana Crumb Pancakes

Either way, Congrats!
 

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