Hey Guys! It's been a while! I have been quite busy the past week.
I moved back down to Los Angeles, I received an awesome grant, and I traveled
to Minneapolis to race in the Medtronic Twin Cities 10 Miler! To top all of
that off, my nutrition is coming along great! I want to tell you all about it.
UCLA, I am back again
On Wednesday I made the five hour and 20
minute drive (with 4 stops!) down to Los Angeles. I am back in my great
apartment with my previous roommate, Ella, and a new addition, Jacquelyn. After
spending three full months living at home and spending a lot of my time alone, it’s
so nice to be surrounded by friends again. I started up classes on the 2nd,
took a final vacation to Minneapolis, and then dived back into it this week.
Cell Biology is interesting, but dense, and my Biophysical Chem class is
jamming through information. Nothing I can't handle, only nine more weeks...
Minneapolis, leading up to the 10 Miler
On Thursday I took a very scary (life-threatening)
bus ride through LA traffic to LAX (my shuttle driver was very aggressive), hopped on a plane and landed in MSP around 11pm. Eric, one
of my teammates, picked me up and helped me get settled into the Airbnb studio
apartment that my mom and I reserved in downtown Minneapolis. My mom's plane got in
at 1am and then we both fell asleep before our
heads hit the pillow around 2am. Friday was busy,
with a meeting at General Mills for a potential job opportunity when I move, a
Medtronic Twin Cities Marathon Reception with Twin Cities in Motion, which the
organization that sponsors Team USA Minnesota and completely puts on the Twin
Cities Marathon weekend events. Between these two events, my mom and I explored the skyway of Minneapolis and
I got to run the first 2.5 miles of the race course. To top it all off, it was
about 50 degrees all day long! Eventually, I got used to it, but man. It’s a
cool day in LA these days when we have a high of 73! It doesn't even get below
60 at night. So, Minneapolis took some getting used to. Saturday was an early
morning of volunteering at the finish line of the 5K, 10K, and kids fun run
races. My mom, Gabe, Jon, Jon, Eric, Gina (all new teammates), and I got to
give out finishers medals. It never ceases to amaze me what an amazing
experience road racing is to so many people. The overwhelming sense of
accomplishment when crossing that finish line shows on so many smiling (and
only ONE puking) faces. I was then checked into the Crowne Plaza in St. Paul
with the other elite athletes. My mom and I explored St. Paul a bit and I was
able to run across and along the Mississippi river to do my final pre-race
shake out. We got dinner at Cossetta with Eric in St. Paul and I got everything
out and ready for the early race morning.
Sunday October 5th, Medtronic Twin Cities 10 Miler
4:34am I rolled over to check the time.
Then, I checked the weather: 36F, feels like 28F. My first reaction: Oh boy, I
wonder what it is in LA. 64F, even with the 2-hour time difference. Okay, that
wasn't going to make anything better. I got up, grabbed my 2 hard-boiled eggs
and cup of granola with almond milk and started chewing. The goal was to get
the food in my belly ASAP. I then put on a base layer, my Saucony jersey, a t-shirt, a long sleeve, a sweatshirt, a down jacket, and a wind breaker. On the
bottom I had on my 1/2 tights, full tights, and then sweatpants. After a quick
ride to the race start with my coach and teammates, we got our warm up going. I
quickly regretted all of those layers. I started to sweat, drenching all of my
upper layers. By the time we were heading to the start line, I was on just my
jersey, arm warmers and (soggy) half tights. I was cold, but surprisingly not
freezing. 5 strides later, the anthem was played and the gun went off.
The women's elite field was not giant, but 5 of us created a pack
out front quickly into the first 200m of the race. The first mile, which
actually was 0.86 (due errors with the road closures) was a combination of
downhill, uphill, hard right turn, hard left turn. I was feeling fresh and we
were moving at (prescribed) 5:45 pace. Mile
two was tough. We were all fresh enough to jam up the biggest hill just after
crossing the river, but it wasn't without some pain. At mile two we dropped to
a lead pack of four. Through mile 3.5 it was up and down, up and down, then it
finally flattened out a bit. Allison Mendez opened up and the pack of 4 turned
into a line of 4, I was holding up the rear. I wasn't feeling like I was
running at my heart rate threshold (where I should be when running all out) but
I couldn't really pick up my legs and go much faster. I have been experiencing
some tightening in my tfls (hips) and IT bands recently, and I know the cold
was not being good to me during this race. The goal was to just maintain. I
will admit, watching the three girls ahead of me take off and disappear around
a curve, I felt like settling. Can’t have that can we? I started to focus on my
core and picking up my knees. Around mile 6 I finally felt like I was getting
into my groove. Some master’s men pulled up beside me and I did my best to work
with them, and came up beside Gina just before mile 8. Mile 4 through 9 were a
slight grade uphill, not enough to visually notice at times, but man did my
splits show it. I just tried to maintain until we reached the crest just after
mile 9 and dropped down to the St. Paul capital building and across the finish
line. I came in 3rd, with a time of 59:04.
The course was very challenging and absolutely beautiful. Twin
Cities in Motion and all of their volunteers did such a fantastic job holding
this race. I got to run my first race as a Team USA Minnesota Athlete in the
amazing place I will soon get to call home. I couldn't have asked for a better
course and experience.
So what’s my take on my finish? I am not too thrilled about how my
pace turned out. Considering some of the workouts I did leading up to this
race, I know I am capable of a faster average mile pace. I also realized during
that first mile that this was the first time I had ever RACED a road race.
Prior to Sunday,
I had only RUN a road race. I spent my past two marathons and my half marathon
running completely alone. It was a completely new experience to be running with
competition and to have to work strategically with and against one another.
Lastly, it was my first race back since my February marathon and my calcaneus
stress fracture. My coach told me that it was expected to feel weird and
different to be back on the roads like that.
So the goal now? Recover, take care of the tightness, and get
ready for the even bigger and more competitive field at the EQT Pittsburgh 10
miler on November
9th!
RRCA Road Scholar Grant
On Tuesday a press release was sent out
naming the eight athletes who received the Road Scholar Grant from the RRCA
organization. It’s a huge honor to not only represent the RRCA while I race the
roads for the next year, but also pretty cool to be included in the list of
incredible athletes who were also named grantees, this year and years prior. It’s
a great feeling to be receiving the same award the 2014 US Marathon Champion
Esther Erb received. I met her at the great Twin Cities elite after party on Sunday and got to hear all about how her race
went, the play by play was great. I find her very inspiring, and to be
considered by the RRCA to have potential, just like she has potential, feels so
great. This organization is helping athletes like me race to roads and continue
to represent the amazing American distance running movement.
FOOD FOOD FOOD (food)
Lastly, a quick nutrition update: Traveling really affected my eating habits and my GI tract. There's no easy way to say that I had to poo
the ENTIRE 10 miler. My regular daily routine was thrown off by the time change
and the early race start and it really did a number (tehe) on my race. I
100% believe that I could have run faster if I wasn't thinking about my bowels
the whole time. I was also tapered for this race so I spent a lot of days
eating and not training hard, which made me feel bloated. Rasa assured me that
it would get easier and would feel better leading up to the race. As for during
the race, she was both empathetic and willing to help me practice with
different breakfast and pre-race meal in order to ward off the urgent need to
find a port-a-potty.
On the regular, I am now back up to 128.0 lbs (my marathon race
weight) and still feeling like I am stuffing myself continuously. It is quite
amazing, though, how much my metabolism has picked up since I started fueling
with more food and more often. I generally sleep well, my mood has drastically
improved, and most importantly, a number of people, including my roommate, grad
mentor, and other good friends, separately told me that I
look good. I no longer look emaciated or tired or too thin. I look like a happy
and rested athlete. It is so reassuring to hear that, because the idea of
gaining weight (like I blogged about before) is not usually a positive thing. I
am finally meeting my energy needs and still training well. It is not without
bumps in the road though, every day has its own challenges with this stuff. My
old ways of eating battle me at every meal, but like Rasa has told me, if I
want to be the best athlete I can be, I need to make sure I am getting the fuel
I need.
