PRO Compression Giveaway Winner

The winner of the PRO Compression giveaway is…

Striding Mom!! Congrats! Look out for my email to get your PRO Compression socks!!

PRO Compression Giveaway!

Who wants to hear a funny story?

The first race I ever ran was the Conejo Valley Turkey Day Dash in November 2009. It took me 36 minutes and 34 seconds to run a 5k. That was also the farthest I had ever run outside in my life. I felt proud and accomplished while I gobbled down turkey and stuffing and potatoes and pumpkin pie that night.

The next morning, however, was a different story. I COULD NOT MOVE. To this day, I don’t think I have ever been so sore. I could barely walk and my calves would scream in pain if I tried to get up after sitting for longer than 3 minutes. Oh, and then we went to San Francisco for the weekend where I had to walk every where and I looked like an 85-year-old.

This is relevant I swear!

Fast forward to April of 2012 – PRO Compression graciously sent our Ragnar Relay team some of their compression socks to wear for training and during the relay. I remember putting them on after a long run and thinking “This is what Heaven feels like!”. I had worn compression sleeves before but wasn’t sold on them, but the PRO Compression socks have just the right amount of squeeze, they are SUPER long (which I love) and come in tons of fun colors.

During our LA marathon training, I even got Jason hooked on PRO Compression as well. We look so stinkin’ cute in our matching socks on Saturdays 🙂

I usually throw on my socks right after we get in from our run and wear them for the rest of the day until bed and I have yet to wake up with any soreness in my calves the following morning. I swear by these babies! And you know where we run there are some serious hills and if it weren’t for PRO Compression I’m sure I’d be gimping around the office every Monday morning.

So now for the exciting part – YOU can win a pair of PRO Compression socks for yourself! You can receive an entry for doing each of the following (leave a separate comment for each item you complete to enter):

1. Like PRO Compression on Facebook
2. Follow PRO Compression on Twitter
3. Tweet about the giveaway (be sure to include @danicalynne and @procompression)

I’ll be randomly selecting a winner on Sunday, 3/3. Good luck!

Long Run and Weekend Fun

I can’t believe it’s already Sunday! The weekends seem to fly by lately and that’s not ok with me. I live for the weekends! Long runs, hanging with friends, sleeping in and wearing my holiest jeans, excuses to not wash my hair… All my favorite things.

The weekend started off right with manicures for Tiff and I before we celebrated National Margarita Day.

I must say that I make some dang good margaritas.

Saturday morning started with a 12.5 mile hilly run for Jas and I. We decided to tackle 2 of our favorite routes combined. We’ve done both routes a number of times but never combined the two loops and let me tell you – it was a challenge!

But it came with some rewarding views:

(Image from http://homebuysblog.com because I didn’t carry my phone to take a picture of the gorgeous view)

After our run I made the most killer dinner I have ever made. I’m not the best cook but every once in a while I end up with some winners and this knockoff Cafe Rio salad was a major hit.

I’ll have the original recipe along with my tweaks up this week. Now Jas and I are settling in to enjoy the rest of our night watching the Oscars and eating leftovers. I hope JLaw wins best actress… I loveeeee her!!

Stupid Foot

So my foot has been numb for a couple weeks now. That’s not normal right?

Rather than go to someone with a PhD and have them tell me (again) how running is bad for your joints and blah blah blah I decided to just let the people at Roadrunner Sports diagnose me. The guy said it could be a combination of my shoelaces being too tight and landing on my forefoot rather than my midfoot. So I did what he said and took a week off of running to ice and cross train and hopefully get the feeling back. And yes that is a frozen wine bag on my foot in the above picture.

So this past week was spent doing some of this:

And a little of this:

And maybe a tiny bit of sulking and temper tantruming on Saturday when my dad and Jason went out on a 10 mile run in perfect weather without me.

So tonight I’m off to run for the first time in a week and I’m pretty freaking excited about it. Wish me luck and pray to the RunGods that I can feel my toes after.

Hey it’s been a while. Remember me?

I’ve missed my little blog! I disappeared for a while and I don’t know if anyone is even still reading but I’m back!

That’s me #nameonawall #famous

A lot has happened since we left off back in June. I took my little hiatus for no reason other than I was busy settling into a new routine and wasn’t really doing much running over the Summer. But now I’m back to running and needing an outlet in a major way because on top of training for Marathon #2 I’m in the middle of a pretty big project:

WE’RE GETTING MARRIED!!!

That’s right! Jason put a ring on it and we couldn’t be happier! He popped the question on October 26, 2012 and we’re planning our wedding for January 18, 2014. I’m so incredibly happy and excited to be marrying my best friend!

There will still be plenty of running stories on this blog, especially now that J has been converted to the dark side and will be joining me for 26.2 miles this March. I’m also going through a bit of a blog identity crisis and thinking of changing up some things in the near future (new name perhaps?). There will also be plenty of wedding-related posts I’m sure. I try to not post every single detail on Facebook, but at least on my blog I will have documented proof when I come up with wedding colors/themes/decor/food plans first (JK (but not really)).

So get excited because now that I’m marathon training, wedding planning, working all day and continuously learning to live as a real human adult, I need this outlet more than ever.

Welcome BAAAACK!!!

 

 

Ojai 2 Ocean Race Reveiw

Continuing on from my last post…

After the race, we headed over to the beer garden for a celebratory brew.

And since my brother looked all sad and lonely standing on the other side of the orange fence, they let him in too.

I  thought this race was really well done. The course was absolutely gorgeous. At times it didn’t even feel like we were running in Southern California.

[source]

Madison had mentioned the lack of water stations last year so I carried my own bottle of Nuun but they really did seem to have aid station ever couple of miles.

They also handed out gels at a few of the stations, but I took my own preferred Gu’s in Chocolate Outrage, Peanut Butter and Espresso Love. Thank God, because Michael said the ones they gave were a bit nasty. Like snot nasty.

They also had a ton of things right at the finish line like bagels, orange slices (cold!), bananas, water, Gat0rade and Clif bars.

The only real negative about this race was the lack of bathrooms at the shuttle pick-up.

I’ve actually said multiple times that I will definitely be running O2O again. I’m still not sure if next year I’ll take on the full again or try for a major PR in the half, but overall I would tell everyone to try this race at least once.

Now off to start a busy Saturday of oil changes and trips to Lowes and Home Depot. Exciting lives we lead!

Ojai 2 Ocean Race Recap (aka my first 26.2)

You obviously already know that I DID IT! I finished my first full marathon!

I also managed to do it without crying, puking or peeing myself (all of these were fears going into the race).

Race day started with a brightandfreakingearly 3AM wake up call. SarahOUaL crashed our guestroom so I at least had someone else to share the pain of pulling myself out of bed at a time that most people our age are just getting to sleep.

I’ve pretty much decided she’s the greatest person ever – besides helping me calm my prerace jitters and offering amazing marathon advice, she brought me this:

Yes, that is an freezable gift bag. Amazeballs.

We hit the road and got up to Ventura pretty quickly. The race was a point-to-point so we had to hop on shuttles at the Fairgrounds in Ventura to take us up to the start in Ojai. We were lucky we took off early because I later found out that they ran out of parking space in the Fairgrounds lot and my Dad and Michael had to park further from the finish line and almost didn’t make it to the start on time.

First (and maybe only) mistake by the race – no porta potties or open bathrooms at the shuttle pick up. We ended up walking through the grounds and finding an open bathroom between some airplane hangars. Luckily, we were able to actually use the bathroom before security showed up and informed us we weren’t supposed to be in there. WTF Compete Green? Runners need to pee A LOT pre-race!

After the bathroom adventure, we hopped on the shuttle and had a 20 minute ride up to Ojai. The entire shuttle ride I kept thinking “Oh my God I need to run this back. Holycrapholycrapholycrap.”

We got to the start, I peed like 3 more times (nerves? or optimal hydration?) and then it was go time.

[source]

I actually managed to find my Dad and Michael as we lined up at the start line. Michael stuck with us for the first maybe .6 mile and then took off (like I said… 3:17 finish… I was surprised he stuck with us that long!).

After about 3 miles I started to feel pain in my right knee. This seemed super weird because of all the pains I’ve experienced during the last year of running, I’ve NEVER had knee pain. Not at all. It actually got to the point where I was running while keeping that leg as straight as possible because it hurt so bad to bend it. Around mile 6 I stopped at the aid station to pop a couple of advil. Luckily, the advil did the trick and the pain quickly became less noticeable.

Mile 1 – 10:24, Mile 2 – 10:09, Mile 3 – 10:27

Mile 4 – 11:23, Mile 5 – 11:30, Mile 6 – 10:59

I took my first gel at Mile 6 and felt a surge of energy despite the knee pain. I also started looking forward to hitting that 10-mile mark. One of the best pieces of advice Sarah gave me was to split the race up into smaller distances by giving myself things to look forward to. Mile 10 = iPod time.

Mile 7 – 11:12, Mile 8 – 10:51

Mile 9 – 11:15, Mile 10 – 10:56

I finally hit play on my iPod and started focusing on the next mini tasks ahead. Besides trying to take in all the scenery (this course was beautiful) I also decided to start looking forward to each water station as my small “break”. I told myself I could only walk through the water stations – no other time – until I hit the 20 mile mark. After all, once I hit 20 miles, I only had to run a 10k. I kept telling myself how easy that would be. “Just get to 20 and then press the restart button. After 20, it’s just a 10k. That’s all.”

I also started focusing on looking for the cowbell guy. This guy managed to show up EVERYWHERE along the course. He was great! He just rang his cowbell, cheered everyone on, and told us how great/strong/awesome we are. My Dad also enjoyed telling him each time we passed “Hey, I saw your brother back there!”

Mile 11 – 10:56, Mile 12 – 11:05, Mile 13 – 11:38

I definitely started to fade once we hit mile 13. As hard as I tried to not let it happen, that one little thought crept up into my head and I couldn’t let it go for quite a while.

“13 miles. If this was a half marathon, I’d be done. I’d be celebrating. I’d be drinking ice cold water. But it’s not a half marathon. I have to do that again.”

That was brutal. I knew crossing that 13 mile mark would be a bit rough, but I didn’t realize how much my mental attitude would affect my running.

Mile 14 – 11:36, Mile 15 – 11:27

Mile 16 – 11:40, Mile 17 – 12:50

My Dad and I did about a half mile of walking during mile 17. I also took my third gel and after a few minutes I felt a lot of energy coming back. My Dad’s feet were really bugging him so he told me to take off whenever. I run/walked the next couple of miles, really feeling the pain all over now. My feet hurt, my ankles hurt, my knee was stiff. But I kept pushing. I started running again after Mile 19 and that’s when I realized something big – I COULD DO THIS.

I could seriously finish this. I could be a MARATHONER. No joke. I got so excited when I realized this. I guess I always had that little bit of doubt, and the knowledge that if I needed to just stop running, I could. But I wasn’t going to and I didn’t need to. I decided that no matter how bad it hurt and how slow I was running, I was going to just keep doing it. Just keep running. My feet were hurting me more than anything and I knew that the sooner I finished the sooner I could get off my poor dying feet.

Mile 18 – 11:45, Mile 19 – 12:48, Mile 20 – 10:40

Mile 21 – 12:04, Mile 22 – 11:47, Mile 23 – 11:40

I also met a nice woman named Stephanie somewhere during this realization. She was running O2O as her 40th birthday present to herself. She was awesome and distracted me for about a mile while we talked Ragnar, previous races and our post-race food plans (she wanted a pie, I wanted lemonade).

(Specifically Hot Dog on a Stick Lemonade – which I have yet to go get) [source]

Once I hit 23 miles and knew I only had a 5k left, I made the decision that I was not going to walk at all. I have never wanted to be done with something so badly. I could feel my whole body just plain hurting. Luckily, I got a HUGE mental boost when a car drove by and I heard someone screaming out “GOOOO DANICA!!!!!! WOOO!!” I turned to see Nicole speeding by hanging out the car window cheering me on. Seriously amazing! Thanks Nicole – I needed that!!!

I turned down my music as the finish line came into view so I could take it all. So many people were cheering and at the last mile I saw Jason and Michael jumping up and down and yelling for me. I think Jason offered to run a little ways with me and I think I told him no (sorry babe!) but I was just so delusional and driven and focused at that point that I couldn’t really process anything but the giant FINISH up ahead. I also knew I had a shot at finishing under 5 hours and I didn’t want to miss that.

Mile 24 – 12:27, Mile 25 – 12:27, Mile 26 – 11:35

.2 – 9:36

When I crossed that finish, I was so overwhelmed/happy/excited/exhausted/emotional and absolutely drained. I have never been so proud of myself for accomplishing something so mentally and physically draining. It was definitely a surreal experience. I get chills just thinking about it.

Final Time – 26.2 miles: 4:59:35

#1 – Done.

(Post-race recap coming tomorrow – this post is way too long already.)

Post Race Sneak Peek

My Dad, Me, My Brother Michael

 

 

 

 

 

 

Unfortunately, I had to be a real adult and go to work today so while I’m compressing in my cubicle, eating my entire lunch before 11am and wishing I was home blogging all about my first marathon experience – here is a picture of all of us after our first marathon. My Dad finished in 5:12, me in 4:49 and Michael (I am not even sure he actually trained for this) in 3:17 (????) (#crazykid).

I Did It!

First marathon – 4:59:35. I ‘m already looking forward to beating that next year. Complete recap up tomorrow, but for now I plan on eating, hydrating, and not moving for 12 hours at least.

Great job to everyone else who ran! Especially all the Ragnar Girls that were there – you have no idea how much you all inspire me to keep working harder and getting faster. Thank you for all your encouragement!

The Night Before: O2O

Excuse me while I freak the eff out. It’s the night before my first marathon, I’m sort of doubting myself, I keep thinking my knees hurt, and I’m worried about everything from Porta Potties to when to take gels to which socks to wear ( compression or no?).

But most of all

I’m really freaking excited.

(Drinks weren’t consumed today – but I might be thinking about one of those bad boys as soon as I hit that finish line).

I can’t wait to post an update tomorrow, but in the meantime – good luck to everyone else running O2O (sarah, nicole, madison, cha cha who is running as the volunteer 4:25 pacer)!!

Marathon #1 – Let’s Do This.