ino the woods

It's been awhile since I my last update. Too long. Okay, so long I had to try three passwords before logging into Blogger. In the weeks since the Blooklyn half marathon, I....

...ran 16 miles over the GW Bridge and through the mega-hills of a park in New Jersey. My regular every 1/2 hour plantar fascitis stretches afforded my plenty of time to gaze at the sparkling river and trees that lined the trail, but I've realized I'm a city runner. Never thought I'd say this but I missed my regular park loops in which I can't go for even a few strides without spotting fellow Brooklynites trotting along with their running buddies, moms hoofing it with their jog strollers, the odd maniacal vagrant power-walking in camouflage. I even missed those out-for-blood bycyclists. I kept thinking, so this is what they mean by the loneliness of the long-distance runner. And if 16 miles through the woods on a sunny day can make me melancholy, you can only imagine what 20 miles through the driving rain in the woods of a state park in Paskataway, New Jersey two weeks later can do. I found out three weeks ago when I...

...ran our second 20 miler on April 8th, the coldest, wettest day we've had this spring. You know things have gone from bad to worse when you find yourself seeking out muddy spots to prance on because their soft, squishy goodness is gentler on your aching feet. And because I stretched every half hour to ease said aching dogs, I ended up running a good bit of it (oh, the last miles or so) by my lonesome. Shivering, shaking, and with no other thought on my mind than a Quarter Pounder value meal at the nearest Mickey Ds, I somehow stifled my tears of self-pity and finished. Not my finest hour.

...not only met but way exceeded by $4,500 fundraising goal!! I'll post names of all of those who so generously gave in my next entry! Thanks so much, everyone!! You rock!

Now, we're in the "tapering" phase. With the marathon just a week and a half away, we're cutting back the mileage. In fact, I'm supposed to run no more than 5 miles at a time no more than 3 times this week. The idea being that by the time race day comes along my body will be hungry for miles and I'll be positively chomping at the bit to burn through 26.2. For now, all I am is hungry, but I'm hoping Coach Ramon's right.

The Brooklyn Half-Marathon

getting a leg up

While lots of women are pears (narrow waist, booty, childbearing hips), I'm an apple (thicker in the middle, smaller butt, lean legs). I'm one in a long line of apple-shaped ladies (my grandmother, Estelle, likes to spontaneously belt out "I ain't got no body," an ode to her flamingo-like legs and short, rounder torso. We love it when hemlines rise, celebrated the birth of the pudge-concealing tankini a few years ago and wouldn't get a belly pierce if it came with a 3-carat diamond. Delicate gams can rock a mini-skirt, and they're an undeniable asset when it comes to, say, synchronized swimming (my 'egg beaters' and 'Eiffel towers' earned applause in our swim club's annual water ballet as a child), but they aren't much help when it comes to long-distance running. While the Saturday long runs (13 miles last weekend; 15 miles yesterday) are hard on us all, I'm usually dragging myself around the park grunting and groaning for the last 3 or 4 miles. An elderly mall walker could easily lap me. I love our Tuesday night speed sections, motor through the RoadRunners fun-runs, but these long runs are agony. After last Saturday's particularly painful 13-miles, my fantastic coach Vanessa gently told me that the orthodics I'm anxiously awaiting will only do so much--building up my lower-body strength is key. Enough with the half-hearted attempts at weight-lifting; I need to put some muscles on these popsicle sticks and fast. So Thursday, I took a sports circuit class (think: obstacle course, cone running, crab walking and lots of squats) at NYSC. Only two of us were in the class (no doubt due to the ungodly 7am hour and not a reflection on Ari, the trainer), so it felt like a swanky personal session! And, while yesterday's 15-miler (yes, 15 miles!!!), still left me limping, it felt just ever-so-slightly easier. I'd like to think all those squats, and not just the change of scenery (we left Brooklyn, trekking up the West Side Highway to Central Park) had something to do with it. So this morning, I did a club strength class. See ya later, swan legs!

"Do I offend?"

"Motherhood makes you lose your vanity," said my friend Kristin, who had a baby last month, as she recounted her 24-hour plus labor and delivery. I'd say the same thing about marathon training. Running tights and jackets composed of various manmade, wicking-type materials are my new weekend uniform. My teammates and I know entirely too much about each other's intestinal going's on (word to the wise: forgo the latte-mug of coffee before a long run) and I can no longer guarantee I'll arrive anywhere but work smelling Irish-spring fresh.

Saturday, I ran the Snowflake 4-miler through frigid Central Park (in a very respectable 36.39), and then, hair matted to my head like a Tiny Tim wig at the bottom of a kid's dress-up trunk, headed to Fifth Avenue to help Max shop for suits at Brooks Brothers. I looked like no one any sane, sighted person would ever take fashion advice from; I wouldn't even take it from myself.

"Don't you want to stop home and take a shower first?" Max asked as I arranged to meet him. "Shower?" I balked, "But I only ran 4 miles!" A few short months ago, I would never have uttered the words "only" and "four miles" in the same sentence, and I certainly wouldn't have trolled in Fifth Avenue (even ducking in Cartier to gawk while waiting for Max to show up) looking like a refugee from VaporWick City. But I'm heartier now, and significantly less concerned with what my body looks like, or what clothes are covering it, than what it's capable of. And that, even more than my race time, makes me proud.

the girl Dunbar good

If you need a rationale for buying armloads of workout clothes or ingesting every sugar or sharp-cheddar laden fat bomb in sight, running a marathon is a pretty stellar one, for a little while at least. Of course I need these remarkably unremarkable white "cool mesh" socks and cranberry track jacket, I reassured myself while standing in front of the register at JackRabbit on Saturday for the third time in three weeks, I'm a runner. Sure I can have another mound of Dunbar macaroni, I reasoned while scooping up another sumo-wrestler sized portion of the outrageous recipe I'd made for our neighbors (but mostly for me), while watching the Superbowl yesterday. More chocolate chip cookie cake with caramel sauce and vanilla ice cream? Dig in, sugar, you're a runner. Sometimes I need to remind myself that I'm training for a marathon, not a tri in running, shopping and testing the outer limits of my body's ability to metabolize fat and sugar. So tomorrow, I'll start the day right, with an amazing pb&j smoothie from The Abs Diet. Several of you have asked for the recipe, so here it is:

3/4 cup low fat vanilla yogurt
3/4 cup 1% milk
2 teaspoons peanut butter
1 medium banana
1/2 cup frozen unsweetened strawberries
2 teaspoons protein powder
4 ice cubes, crushed

Serves 2. I like to crush the ice cubes first in the blender first, then add the rest of the ingredients and blend some more. Pour it in a thermal mug and sip it while you put on your makeup, or on the subway (but never while doing your makeup on the subway). Yum!

In big news this week, I ran 12 miles on Saturday! It took 2 1/2 hours and for the last 3 miles I couldn't have been slower if I were standing still, but I persevered. My teammate, Sarah, who kept up a welcome stream of chatter through the entire run, carried me through. Sarah's husband, Nate, was diagnosed with a rare form of lymphoma a year ago and he kept pace with us part of the way. It's hard to whine about aching arches, or anything really, when you're running with someone who's just had a bone marrow transplant. Hello, instant perspective!

Last Friday, I'd had lunch with Valerie, a former colleague who was also diagnosed with lymphoma this year. We worked together for a few zany months at a web site five years ago, kept in sporadic touch, and it wasn't until I sent out the link for this blog that I learned what she'd been through. Great news though--she just got the all clear from her doctor. Yay, Valerie! Check out Valerie's amazing blog.

The stars must be aligned in my house of money this week, because in addition to snapping up a running jacket half-price at JackRabbit, I won the office Super Bowl pool! I only bought one box and took away $200! I was too enraptured by my Dunbar macaroni to realize I'd won the big prize until this morning, when our copy chief, Wendy, came by my desk holding a wad of moola. I pledged it to the Leukemia and Lymphoma Society, so now I'm the top banana on my donor list--want to dethrone me? I double Dunbar-macaroni dare you!

quite a pair

On Saturday, I bought sneaks. Adidas Kayanos in gray and lavender. I would have prefered white and orange, or orange and fuschia, or anything but gray, but as I learned today, you're supposed to buy running shoes based on a myriad of factors like whether your feet overpronate or underpronate, the height of your arches and the length of your stride, none of which has anything to do with the hue. And, since the sneaker companies only seem to release each style in one or two colors at any one time, when you find that perfect sole mate, you pounce on it. Even if it's mauve and beige. Even if it's gray and lavender. All these things I learned at Jack Rabbit, my local neighborhood running store. I'd dragged myself there with Rebecca and Kate after our post-run-brunch. We'd run 7-miles through Prospect Park, and my feet felt like I'd tromped the entire distance in stilletos. "Sneakers have a life span, and yours are dead," said the saleswoman, and we both looked down at my one-year-old Adidas Gel Classics. This was news to me. I'd once managed to wear the same pair of Nike cross-trainers for three years, and I only bought three pairs of cleats in 10 years of soccer (a testament to how little time I spent on the field). Nearly two hours later, after trying on nearly every pair of shoes in the store and running on the treadmill in every one (the pros at Jack Rabbit videotape your stride to gauge the sneak's fit), I walked out with my Kayanos. In a size 8. I usually wear a 6 1/2 or 7, but turns out feet swell during marathons, and too-small shoes are the biggest reason marathoners lose their toenails. Since anything involving toenail damage has always been one of my biggest phobias (just one of those things...), I erred on the side of caution. The sneaks proved their might in my timed mile run tonight. To gauge our speed, we ran two one-mile loops of the park. I was strangley nervous--flashbacks to those mile runs in the Presidential Fitness Awards, but I did one in 9min and the second in 9:02, and my feet felt just fine. I've found my sole mates.

bring on the gourmet Bengay!

This morning I ran my first New York Road Runners race, the Fred Lebow 5-Mile Classic, along with 2,891 other runners in Central Park. I got up at 7am to buzz a PB&J power-smoothie (it tastes way better than it sounds) in the blender and made my way to 102nd street to meet my Team-in-Training (TNT) comrads at the start line. I found Rebecca and Kate at the entrance to the park and together we pinned on our race numbers, dropped our coats in baggage and huddled with the rest of our team for a pep talk from Coach Michael, who assured us that 1) we would all cross the finish line no problem and 2) we were all dressed more appropriately for a run through Reykjavik than unseasonably balmy Manhattan. He was right on both counts. Rebecca, Kate and I stuck together the length of the course, sweating through a half-dozen layers of Dry Fit and fleece, and crossed the finish line in 53 minutes and 17 seconds. After shameless hugs, high-fives and photo-snapping, Kate and I headed to a nearby school to take advantage of the Road Runners' hot cocoa and bagels the size of a baby's head. Then I went home and, spirits high but gams stiff, reached for Kiehl's Klaus Heidegger's All Sport Muscle Rub, a freebie from the beauty closet at work. It'd been sitting unopened in my medicine cabinet for months now, and with its German-Olympian's-secret-remedy sounding name I never felt like I'd actually worked out hard enough to deserve it. Today I slathered it on and breathed its outrageous eucalyptous scent in deep. I've earned it!

Update: Here's one more picture of me and my fellow runners!

Welcome to See Laura Run!

Greetings and welcome to See Laura Run! On May 7, 2006, I'll be completing the Adidas Vancouver International Marathon--yes, all 26.2 miles--with the New York City Chapter of the Leukemia & Lymphoma Society. I have never been what you'd call an athlete. Not even close. As a kid, my most dreaded day of school each year was that of the notorious Presidential Fitness Awards 1-mile test, when getting a "satisfactory" in phys ed demanded booking it around a gravel track four times, lungs burning and matchstick legs turning to fettucine. In high school, I spent far more time keeping the benches toasty for the women's soccer team than anywhere near the actual playing field. Since those years on the sidelines, to stay healthy and ward off twentysomething scale creep, I've regularly yet often reluctantly dragged myself to my local New York Sports Club. There, I'd plod on the treadmill while compulsively switching channels on the attached TV monitor, desperately trying to distract myself with breakfast shows and Who's The Boss reruns. By the time I pushed "stop," I'd logged 30 minutes and 3 miles, yet gone nowhere. Yet this past December, at the urging of my friend Cara, I signed up to become a member of Team in Training and raise money for leukemia, Hodgkin and non-Hodgkin Lymphoma and myeloma while training for my first marathon. By this spring, with your support, I'll have raised $4,500 for blood cancer research and patient programs. I'll also have covered hundreds more miles than I would have if I were still in treadmill mode, forged a slew of friendships through the camaraderie of running endless loops of Central Park and Propect Park in lockstep during the New York City winter, and strode for 26.2 miles through ravishing Vancouver. Keep pace with me as I chronicle my own amazing race.