Alright, I know I just fell off the face of my blog for the past week. I did start a post last Thursday but never finished it due to travel issues that gave me an unplanned overnight in Detroit and left me running on 2 hours of sleep last Friday (not great). Then over the weekend I spent Saturday catching up with friends and ran a relay on Sunday. The craziness of my schedule continued Monday when I joined in the Boston Strong Syracuse event and last night officially started our kickball season!! So, my life is a little crazy right now, and I haven’t had the time or inspiration to catch up with writing this past week. However, I am going to change that right now and use my lunch break to catch you up on the happenings of the past week! (Warning: long blog post to ensue.)
So first, the travel schedule – I had a board meeting to attend in Kansas City last week. Nothing too exciting here, but it did make for some interesting scheduling of my workouts in the hotel. Also, it gave me a chance to look pretty crazy to the other people in the workout room as I kept jumping between the stationary bike and the treadmill for my brick workout.
 |
| Hotel gyms are not my favorite. |
As I mentioned, on my way back from KC I was stranded in Detroit due to weather. I’m not going to get into details since I was pretty frustrated with the entire situation, but I will share the one bright point which was the ability to have some Caribou Coffee the next morning when I returned to the airport at 4:30 am for my second attempt to return home.
The time in the airport also gave me some time to think about my upcoming races… I checked out my countdown app and realized that the racing season is truly upon me! The next three up:
When I finally returned home Friday around noon, I was exhausted and most of Friday was spent just trying to catch some rest and fit in my swim workout. Which I will say, swimming when your body is exhausted is not fun. I really think that workout was one of the longest swim workouts that I have ever endured.
Saturday brought sunny skies to Syracuse, however when you got outside, the wind and temperatures reminded you that yes, we do still live in Upstate NY and no it’s not quite spring yet. Regardless of what the calendar might say. I was supposed to have a 3 hour outdoor bike ride for my training, so my friend and I decided to attempt an outdoor ride even though it was only about 45-50 degrees out. We lasted 1 hour 20 minutes before we called it a day. My toes were SO cold. I guess I now understand why some bikers have covers for their shoes for colder days. I’m definitely ready for spring to actually arrive since I have another 3 hour ride scheduled for this coming weekend.
Sunday brought about The Seneca 7 Relay Race. Myself and a few friends from my running group signed up for this relay back around Christmas. This race starts in Geneva, NY and runs the entire length (77.7 miles) around Seneca Lake (one of the Finger Lakes in Upstate NY). Our team decided to run under the name “The Halfminds” and we also decided to dress up for the event with the guys sporting kilts and the girls in tutus. One of girls made blue and yellow ribbons for us to wear in honor of the events in Boston last week and we also decided to sport the blue and yellow in our tutus. I was surprised that not very many people dressed up in any crazy outfits for this relay. Definitely a different experience than Ragnar… but it did mean that our team was pretty popular. I feel we had our picture taken a LOT by other runners and the event staff.
The race started at 7:30 am and we were to report at the start line around 6:30 – along with travel time, this meant a 4:30 am departure from my house Sunday morning. I have to admit these early mornings are one of the things that I both love and hate about racing. I really hate getting up that early, but once I’m up and going I love the fact that I am up before the sun and ready to take on the day!
 |
| The Halfminds at the Start Line… |
 |
| CBW & I in our tutus! |
I have to admit, I was pretty hesitant about the whole running in a tutu bit, I’ve seen other people run in them and just thought it would be annoying and slow you down. However, it turns out that running in a tutu is really fun and didn’t bother me a bit (must be my inner 7 year old shining though)!
In fact, I actually hit a new PR this week with my first leg of the relay. I ran 4.6 miles in 33 minutes, leaving me a 7:15 pace! (Seriously, when did I learn how to run?)
My running stats for this race were as follows:
Leg 1: 4.6 miles, roadkills 22-4
Leg 2: 4.9 miles, roadkills 16-1
Leg 3: 2.6 mile, roadkills 7-1
In short, I think I’ll just always run in a tutu. Why? For 3 simple reasons:
1) I’m sure people are just thrilled to be passed by a chick in a tutu.
2) It made me run faster [just kidding, I know my training is paying off]
3) It’s fun.
Note: Reason 3 is definitely the most important reason.
 |
| Hanging out with the team, trying to stay warm before my second leg! |
 |
| Our team at the finish line – ready to do this again next year! |
After the race on Sunday, I definitely woke up a little sore Monday. (My legs are not used to running that fast, for that many miles…) The good thing is that my schedule was calling for a planned rest day… the bad news was that I found out about the Boston Strong Syracuse event and wanted to participate. Luckily CBW and RB who also ran Seneca 7 had the same reaction. We all decided to grab some yellow and blue (of course I grabbed the tutu) and head to the parkway to walk in the event to show support. Also, I think Rox was excited that I decided to walk since that meant I could bring her along. She sported the blue and yellow ribbon that Nurse had made me.
 |
| Rox is ready for the Boston Strong event. |
Overall, Syracuse had a fantastic turnout for the event and got some great local news coverage. Our friend even got on the 9WSYR
news clip (see the guy with headband toward the end – you can see Roxie in the background to the left…).
Yesterday, I headed down to Ithaca to be a guest lecturer for the Cornell Vet students for work, then I had a chance to stop by one of the local wine stores that I used to go to when I was at undergrad. I was SO excited because they carried Zuccardi wine! I met the Zuccardi family last May when I traveled to
Argentina with my grad school class, so it was very cool to be able to buy a bottle of their wine in the US! Now if only I could just travel back to South America again for another week…
 |
| Zuccardi!! |
So if you’re still reading, I’m impressed. But seriously, thanks, hopefully you’re finding some of this interesting. I thought I would leave off this post with a three random tidbits and teasers for this week.
First: My current song obsession. I’ve been listening to this for about 2 weeks, and I haven’t managed to kill it yet, but I’m sure I will shortly.
 |
| Obsessed. |
Second: I’m 9 weeks from Syracuse 70.3. Training is going well, and I’m excited to see what lies ahead as I continue to work with Coach K!
 |
| Training Plans Continue! |
Last: Remember
Chickin Wing Wednesday? Well, we’re following up with Mac and Cheese Monday. Stay tuned for updates on the delicious (this time homemade) goodness of the next food tasting expedition!
 |
| Coming up: Mac and Cheese Monday! |
I hope you’re all having a great week & hopefully I’ll post a little more often to avoid the need for another mega-post like this!
amiethomas518.wordpress.com 
