Power Songs

When Lynette and I run, we use our Nike+ chips and iPod Nanos to keep track of our time and distance. It's a great way to lose yourself in the workout and let it worry about how long or how far you have left to go. You can set a workout to be a particular distance, or a particular length of time, and a soothing voice will periodically chime in via your earbuds and tell you when you've hit certain checkpoints (every mile for distance and every 5-10 minutes for time).

Another feature I just figured out how to use is the Power Song. You can choose any song that's loaded on your iPod to be your Power Song. During your workout you can trigger it by holding down the button on the iPod. Last night I chose "Get It On" by Chase as my Power Song. It's exactly 3 minutes long, so when the nice robot lady said "3 minutes to go," I pressed the button and started the song. I immediately found a gear I didn't have before, and kicked into it. What a great feeling. I don't normally listen to music during my runs, but I think I'm going to start using my Power Song more often.

I recently found a site called slowgeek that uses the Nike+ API to pull down publically available data about all Nike+ users who haven't set their profile to "private." They offer an alternative way to view your workout data, but one of the more interesting things they've done is to pull data about everyone's Power Songs. Turns out Survivor is extremely popular with the running crowd - over 700 people have "Eye of the Tiger", making it easily the most popular Power Song. Given all this data, I had an interesting idea - make a playlist consisting exclusively of all the most popular power songs. This could easily backfire: if I kicked into that gear I used durinig "Get It On" during the whole run, I'd burn out within a half mile. Maybe it's worth a shot, though.

Fundraising Goal is Met!

Thank you to everyone who has contributed to our fundraising effort. We are now at our goal of $2,400! And the best part is, that was just from the website! This morning I sent in the checks and cash that we've received so far, which totaled $435! The Partylite party alone brought in a little over $125!

It's not over, though, so if you still want to contribute, please feel free! From this point on, 100% of the donations (instead of 75%) go straight towards research and patient services. For instance, families who are struggling can receive $500 from The Leukemia and Lymphoma Society to help them meet basic needs.

I am so thankful that we've met our goal. We couldn't have done it without our friends and family! Back in November, $1200 each seemed like a pretty high goal, even though it's the lowest fundraising minimum for all the spring events. If we were going to Nashville or another destination marathon, we'd have had to raise about $3500 each!! That's because the donations covers the cost of travel and lodging, but since we're going to Champaign, we're responsible for our own travel and lodging.

If you are interested in coming down to Champaign to cheer us on, all the information for the event is here: http://www.illinoismarathon.com/index.html

You can find a map of the event route here: http://www.illinoismarathon.com/coursemaps.htm

Thank you to everyone who has supported us, it means the world to us.

- Lynette

8 Mile(s)

Today we had the longest run to date, 8 miles. Luckily, the weather report said it would hit 50 today, which it seems to have done. It was a beautiful day. The only patch of ice left was in one spot in shadows. It was treacherous, but as long as you were careful over it, you were fine. I don't think anyone took a major spill. More importantly, today was the day I was going to try "eating" or "using" or "consuming" I guess, some energy gel.

Ever since the very first kickoff meeting, the coaches and experienced runners have been talking about this carbohydrate-packed gel that marathon runners use to get a boost of energy during a race. There are dozens of brands, and each brand has many different flavors, including "Razz," "Double Expresso," "Mountain Blast," "Tropical Burst," etc. None of these seem especially appealing to me, mainly because of the texture I think. On top of this, there are several different jelly bean or swedish fish type products adding to the confusion. Now, add in to this the constant warnings from the coaches to "Make sure you find out which ones work for you. It's no fun trying to sprint to a port-a-potty in the middle of a race," and "Be sure to drink at least 16 ounces of water NOT GATORADE with every gel pack." Needless to say, we were paranoid, and last week we bought one of just about every flavor from every brand.

Lynette tried two different fruit flavors on two different days while she wasn't running, and found one she liked ok. I sampled a little bit of each one that she tried, and could not stand it. It reminded me of the crazy bubble-gum flavor fluoride gel that the dentist used on my teeth as a kid. I decided I would probably feel different when I needed it during a run, so I picked one that seemed the least offensive (Espresso), and resolved to try it in the middle of our 8 mile run today.

I had it in the pocket of my "fuel belt" as we started our workout this morning. Also on the fuel belt: 10oz. water, 10oz. Gatorade. I was also doing a trial run with the fuel belt, and I figured I might as well try them both at the same time since I'll need to drink the water with the gel anyway (or else I'll... explode?)

I had decided to try it after mile 4, but when I got to that point, without thinking I drank about half my Gatorade. Oh NO! Um, well, I'm sure it'll be fine. I broke out the foil packet, and bravely tore it open. I squirted the goop into my mouth with gusto. (I was still nervous, but it's hard to be delicate in the middle of strenuous physical activity.) The taste was... not that bad! The espresso flavor turned out to be kind of like eating melted frosting. I took about three mouthfuls of the stuff, then spotted a garbage can a little off the road. I hadn't considered what I would have done with a sticky, open packet of gunk, so I'm glad the trash can appeared. Then I frantically chugged almost all of my water, hoping it would do whatever it was supposed to do.
I wish I had some hilarious tale of vomiting into a car window or dashing to a port-a-john, but it actually turned out just fine. After 8 miles I still felt great, so maybe it did its job. No way am I trying any other flavors, though. I'm good.

Nutrition

It used to be I could eat pretty much whatever I wanted. I have a high metabolism, and I don't put on weight, so I didn't think much of having McDonald's for lunch instead of a ham sandwich or something. But now that I've started this training, I can tell when I haven't eaten well. McDonald's for breakfast and Taco Bell for lunch do not add up to a successful training session. I'm sort of amazed at how much difference it makes if I eat a bowl of oatmeal in the morning as opposed to a couple of doughnuts. It's one thing to hear the coaches talk about it, it's another to feel completely wiped after 1 mile when you're supposed to run 3 or 4.
This does not mean that I am turning into a health nut - I'll still be preferring 2% milk to skim, and not trimming the fat from my steak before I cook it. However, we are going to have to run over 13 miles on April 11. According to our training schedule, that's 1 mile further than we will have ever gone before. I am starting to take very seriously all the advice about power gels, carbs, and proper nutrition that we've been getting.