Can One Actually Call It Running?

Not sure, but this morning I and two of my best gal pals were out on the road running the Get In Gear 5K for the second year. We are all at different places in our training prep and what-not and the results were appropriate. Jess bested her last year's finish by shaving off close to a minute. Jen and I just had one goal in mind--jog the route as much as possible. Mission accomplished and then some. We did jog the entire 5K, although I feel fairly certain had we walked, we may not have finished too much farther behind. We left some in the tank for a final dash at the end. Jen really busted it out--I have no idea where she got it from, but roasted across the finish line. I was very impressed (and somewhat jealous!).

The weather was expected to be crappy--rain and wind, but ended up absolutely ideal for running. It was mid-40s, light breeze and overcast (non-threatening) skies.

We had a few fans on the course today--Jess's hubby, little girl and a niece were in attendance. Even though they missed us coming in, it was nice they were there for support.

I am proud to say that I know one of the top female finishers--Chrissy Bloemendal finished fourth overall against 1000+ female runners. Wow~ Hat's off to her.

I am looking forward to making it an annual tradition. Right, girls?

Now I look forward to the MS Walk (shameless plug for your financial support here) next week, the Kenny 5K on May 30 and who knows what after that.

Photos I took while on a walk

Here are a few extra photos I took while I was out for a walk one night after dinner. This is also the same road I would run, so there's no wonder I was able to just relax and go.

Another 5K

Time to Fly Run5K Results Jun 28th, 2008 - St. Paul, MN

#.......Name...............OVERALL......TIME......PACE

4773...Nick Bassett..........129/456............26:31..........8:32
4753...Carl Iverson..........152/456............27:13..........8:46
4770...Eric Iverson..........153/456............27:14..........8:46

4769...Jennifer Jensen....367/456............35:15.........11:21

I ran my first 5K back in April with a finish time of 36:11. I have run four times since then, so I was quite pleased with the latest finish time, shaving off almost an entire minute. I ran with my two older brothers, Eric and Carl, and Nick, my 12 year old nephew/godson. We had a small fan section--Mom, Dad, Steve (Nick's Dad) and Miles (Carl's 21 month old son).

(Eric, Carl, me and Nick before the race)

The weather was fabulous--high 60s and cloudy with a slight breeze. An isolated shower came in just as I was coming in at the finish. The course was a simple layout--long leg out, long leg back with a downhill entry to the finish. What a way to kick it into high gear for the final stretch.

My problem this race was that at about the 2 mile mark, I had to pee so damn bad. So I didn't dare pick up the pace lest I wet myself. So I held out until the end with my final burst. I bee-lined it to the biffy as quickly as I could after I ran through the finish chute. The port-o-potty couldn't have been a sweeter sight to my eyes.

(After the race)

Anyway, another race has been chalked up; my third registered run. I think I've caught the running bug. I've got a couple more coming up in September and I'll have to see what's out there for July / August. Anyone interested?

Woot-woot!

A whole lotta family lovin' going on...

Yep, for the first time in four years, my entire family will be reunited. Four years ago, there were 16 of us; now there are 20. Carl and family from Houston are coming for a visit this weekend. That means there will be a lot of family togetherness going on.

This evening begins the fun: we're invited over to my parents after 7 pm to see Carl and son Miles. Carl's wife, Claire will be arriving tomorrow.

Tomorrow morning, I run a 5K with my Eric, Carl and our 12-year old nephew Nick. I am pretty sure I will start the race with the boys, but will be about ten minutes behind them at the finish. That's just fine by me.

Saturday evening, it's the Iverson Family Singers leading the music at Mass. Two nephews are alter boys. The non-singing sibling, Carl will be the lector. We then have dinner at Jeanine's house.

Sunday is my parents' 45th wedding anniversary. Amazing! We will be having a (hopefully) quiet dinner at the parents' house. It will be a collaborative effort. My contribution? I am in charge of providing the kids' meal for 8 kids ranging from 22 months to 13 years' old. Hmm, what to make...

I hope your weekend plans are a little less involved than ours are. Or on the flipside, I hope it's just as fulfilling. I'd like to hear what you've got planned, so drop a comment.

Have a good one!

Something you should avoid

I would strongly recommend refraining from carb-loading less than thirty minutes before you run. Because you kinda feel sick when you are running.

Yeah, my bad.

I had leftover gnocchi and Chicken Parmesan from Maggiano's for dinner. Then we left for the lake. Kyle took Max in the stroller and Cate on her bike and they headed one direction around the lake, while I went the other direction. It's been a while--over two weeks since I really had some good exercise. So I ended up walking a couple of times. Still, I made it around the 2.75 mile lake in approximately 33 minutes. I'm okay with that.

And I learned my lesson.

My First 5K!

31st Annual GET IN GEAR 10K Run/Walk
Minneapolis, MN Saturday April 26, 2008
5K OFFICIAL RESULTS - FEMALES

Place Bib Name Div Age Time Pace
1 5442 DEBRA GORMLEY 1 41 20:33 6:37
517 5573 JENNIFER JENSEN 101 34 36:11 11:39
537 5660 JESSICA K. 106 34 36:36 11:47
602 5880 JENNIFER N. 118 34 38:10 12:17




Okay, so I didn't run like a Kenyan, but I felt I ran a good race nonetheless, as did my partners who motivated me to sign up with them. I can not imagine running a 6:37 mile. That is pure insanity!

The weather at race time was gross. I'm still cold--12 hours after finishing. As mentioned in an earlier post, I started my training in single digit weather with below zero wind-chills to contend with. But this is the end of April, for goodness' sake. This morning we woke up to 32 degrees, snow on the ground and the wind gusting up to 25 MPH in our fair city. It was indeed crappy weather. But that didn't stop the people from coming out to run /walk.

My impression of this type of run / walk format was that we would line up according to pace and once the race started, the walkers would stay to one side of the road, the runners on the other side. It was not to be. We girls were toward the rear of the pack waiting for 9:50 to approach and then the mass of participants just started to move. There was no audible horn or starting gun to mark the beginning of the race. Once moving out of the chute, it took a while to get some room to get the stride going. And then when it started opening up a bit, it was a challenge to bob and weave through the walkers who meandered through the route and keep the momentum going. Because of these reasons, it didn't take long for us to get separated. Whether we intended to or not, we each ended up running our own race.

Despite the crappy weather, my Dad got out to the course and cheered us on. It was really neat to hear him call out: "Jennypoo!" to catch my attention on my way out, approximately at the one mile marker. On my way back, he was there again and I gave him a high five and kept on trucking with his encouraging cheers, "You're looking real strong out there. Keep it up!"

For the final quarter mile, there was a mild incline and straight-on wind gusts greeted us. While I tried to keep a little left in the tank for the finish, the wind was countering my efforts and I just couldn't make the final burst I had planned for. In the end, it didn't matter. The most important thing is that we all ran the entire course and we are living to tell about it.

We rock! Thanks again, girls, for inviting me to run with you. I'm looking forward to our next race together.

My rainy day run

Today was the last scheduled training run before my first 5K on Saturday. As luck would have it, rain came in over night and rained all day. But back in March, I started my training in single digit weather. So I decided that I couldn't let a little rain hold me back.

It rained during my entire run. Unfortunally, many an earthworm found a sudden splat under my shoe. Ew! But, I practically had the lake to myself. It was amazingly quiet. I listened to pounding of my feet on the path and concentrated on my breathing. Thought about my game plan for the run on Saturday.

Hardly anyone else was out so I saved extra steps by not having to weave and dodge around the walkers who walk three people wide (I hate that!). I made good time.

Sure enough, after being soaked for thirty minutes, I got into the car and the rain stopped. The sun came out. Damn. If only I had waited a little longer.

But all in all, I had a great run. I felt really good. I'll run in the rain any day.

Washington DC Day 4: April 14, 2008

Alright...time to hasten this thing up. I've been reading the vacation summary and it's really quite a yawn. I have been having fun experimenting with a couple of formatting things, but geez, already. It's just as bad as sorting through the 91 pictures from the trip...

As you are aware, I've been "training" for a 5K run and I have been trying to follow the plan as closely as possible. I fully intended to remain on track even while on vacation. I managed to run the treadmill in the hotel on Saturday evening and Monday, I got the opportunity to hit the road out in Sterling, VA. Kyle and "Tall" Cate took the kids to the Udvar-Hazy Center--an extension of the National Air and Space Museum out near Dulles Airport and I jogged around the Coleman neighborhood with Pat toodling on his bike. He mis-calculated the distance to the pedestrian path (he thought it was 3/4 mi one way, where in reality it was close to a 1-1/2 miles), so I just jogged until he told me to turn around. I uttered expletives under my breath the entire time.

After Elizabeth came home from school, we met up with the others at the Great Falls State Park. I liken it to Gooseberry Falls in Minnesota. Water rushing through, rocks to climb, a great picnic area to play in. Here are pictures from our time there...

We stayed for dinner: hamburgers, pasta salad, and asparagus made especially for "Short" Cate which, to my embarrassment, she didn't eat. Afterwards, we said our good-byes and drove back to return our car rental and metro back to the hotel. The good-bye that evening was the final one for a long time, which made all of us a bit sad... In the end, another full day.

Easter 2008

I am sad to say this year, I didn't attend an Easter Mass for the first time in my entire thirty-four year old life.

Darn Catholic guilt.

Yesterday, Max started getting sick. So I stayed home with the kids and Kyle sang in choir for the two and a half hour Vigil Mass. The Easter Vigil in my mind, is the most wonderful Mass celebrated in the entire church season. In addition to Max being ill, I also chose to stay home partly for selfish reasons--I find no joy in attending Mass right now. We have a sacramental minister priest who is currently assigned to our parish and he really, really enjoys preaching. So the homily is minimum twenty minutes long. I know it's a terrible reason to not find joy in attending Mass, the homily is such a small part of the entire celebration. But, in the past, there have been many a Sunday where I swear the message in the homily was being delivered to me and me alone. Sadly though, I can't remember any of the messages from any of the homilies he has delivered in the past year-plus he has been at our church. I get so distracted, irritated actually, that I can't focus then on the rest of the liturgy.

I did half-heartedly intend to go to another local parish's Sunday 6pm Youth Mass. But as I was online with a dear friend, I noticed the time was already seven past the hour. Shucks.

But, whether or not I went to Mass today, Easter is here...Jesus Christ has Risen Today--Alleluia!

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On a more secular note from Easter celebrations...

This morning, we got our Easter outfits on and headed over to my parents' house for the kids' egg hunt followed by Easter dinner. You can tell in the photo that Max was still feeling a bit punk. It was a laid back occasion. We were the last ones there and the first ones to leave this year, which is quite unusual. We are usually the ones who remain until supper. In addition to Max being sick, Kyle was dealing with a cold as well. I just wanted to get my family home.

This is a photo of all the local "Iverson" grandchildren:

From left to right: Max, Jack (13), Henry (4), Charlie (10), Millie (2-1/2), Nick (11), Cate. Missing: Miles (1-1/2) lives in Houston, TX. We look forward to seeing him this June.

Here's a cute Easter dinner table story. Max is truly coming along with word comprehension. And after each meal, we grab a wipe to clean hands and face. Today, Max got hold of a wipe and wouldn't let anyone help him. So I talked him through it:

"Can you wipe your mouth?" (Max pats his mouth)

"Can you wipe your nose?" (Max dabs his nose)

"Can you wipe your cheeks?" (Max reaches around to his bottom and wipes the butt of his pants)

Apparently, we didn't know that someone refers to his bottom as cheeks or butt-cheeks...

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I got another run in today to keep on task with my 5K training program. Today was a 44 minute run: 10 min walk, 10 min run, 1 min walk, 8 min run, 15 min walk. I started out at the parents' house and it took me 10 minutes to walk down to the lake. Sweet! Then I started my run (jog). I made it around the lake despite the slippery, uneven conditions, so I kept on running all the way home. I finished the 3.32 miles route in 41.29 minutes. I was so pleased!

Happy Anniverary to Me!

Tomorrow is the one year anniversary of the Saturday that I started Weight Watchers, but more importantly, today is the one year anniversary that I had had enough and made up my mind that it was time to go. So bravo to me!

I started my weight loss journey on Saturday, March 10th. I exceeded my goal weight on Friday, October 26th, losing 47 pounds. I am currently sitting at 45 pounds down. My goal is to hit the 50+ pound mark by the time I go on vacation to Washington DC in April. I know I can do it. One of my best friends who is also losing significant weight reminded me last week that this weight loss is not a game (my mantra during the weight-loss phase was "game on!"), it's a lifestyle change. So, since I am competitive in nature, I am looking at it this way: I need to switch from the short distance sprint to a long marathon pace for the rest of my life. I know I will hit many walls along the way, but I am confident I will make it to the finish line at the end of my days living the healthiest life I could.

Speaking of running, I'm "training" for a 5K coming up in late April that I am doing along with two of my dear friends. I put training in quotations, because I think it's funny that one needs to train for a 5K. Some people aspire to do triathalons or marathons. I am aspiring to complete a 5K. So, in order to do it to the best of my ability, I signed up for an online training guide. It's a walk/run program. Yesterday was my second walk/run. 10 minutes walk/8 minutes run/10 minutes walk. Aside from it being really freaking cold outside yesterday, I was able to get it done. It will be nice when I don't have to worry about the snow and ice under foot. I am hoping it will make the running a little easier.