The Year in Review

I thought I would break out the training blog once again. After reading through my last post after the Tinkerbell Half Marathon in January I was inspired to document not only as I start training again for the Tinkerbell Half Marathon in January of 2014, but also of this past year and the journey my running has been on.

In January, once again, eLiz and I will be running in the Tinkerbell Half Marathon. In a very wise move, RunDisney has added the Tinkerbell 10k to the lineup of activities for the whole weekend and we will be joined by AP (my oldest brother), LP (my sister-n-law), JS & DS (Niece and husband), and LW (cousin) who will all be running/walking the 10k.  I might be more excited about getting to chEAR for everyone than actually running myself.
                                             

This past year has been a struggle for many different reasons.  The exhilaration of the accomplishment of my first half marathon spurned on a continued desire to run, but with that comes the need to really look at all aspects of my life and find the areas that need improvement in order to continually do better and push myself to run better.  For me, the major area that needed improvement is consistency (running regularly) in which the motivation to do so is directly related to my health and diet.  This has been a huge struggle. I have had to come to terms with things such as fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue, and food allergies. I am continually learning and improving and hope to have a real handle on it all sometime soon.

In April of this year I ran a 10k along the beautiful Morro Bay coastline.  Then in July I ran a half marathon along the same route which was the most difficult run I've had. Most of the run is along the surf line, on the hard sand, but a portion of the run takes you off the hard sand, through soft, SOFT sand, along a pathway then back through the SOFT sand to the finish. I will never run this one again.  I have to give my friends SC & DB a high five for bearing through this run with me as well as for the training support ahead of time. I think we have all agreed that this is not a re-do.    
                                     

I half-heartedly trained (if you can even call it that) for another half marathon in Santa Barbara with SC in November.  SC finished the run like a rock star ! as well as her brother (NK) and good friend (CG).  Regardless of my lack of training I still managed to shave 20 minutes off of my January 1/2 time.  I do have to admit, I did enjoy the course and you can't beat the climate in SB in November - with a coast line view at the finish line.
                                       

When I look back at the year I am very proud of these accomplishments. I just wish my body felt better considering the work that I am putting into it.  That is my hope for this next year - to improve not only my run times but my health in general. I'm sure the latter will greatly impact the first.

I don't know what this next year will bring.  I am very much looking forward to spending some fun quality time with my family at the Tinkerbell Half Marathon weekend in January.  I am also looking for training for, dare I say, a full marathon with SC later in the year.